11 A.D.2d 709 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1960
In a proceeding to construe the eighth and ninth paragraphs of testator’s will, James Lord, Jr., a legatee and a stepson of the testator, appeals from a decree of the Surrogate’s Court, Suffolk County, entered July 14, 1959, construing such paragraphs as entitling said legatee to 200 shares of stock in the General Electric Company and directing that the remaining shares of such stock now held by the testator’s trustee be turned over to petitioners, who are the residuary legatees and the natural children of the testator. Decree modified on the law and facts: (1) by striking out the first ordering paragraph, and (2) by substituting therefor a provision construing said two paragraphs of the will as requiring the trustee to deliver to said legatee, James Lord, Jr., 600 shares of General Electric Company stock now held by such trustee, and as requiring the trustee to deliver the remaining shares of such stock to petitioners. As so modified, decree affirmed, with costs payable out of the estate to all parties filing separate briefs. Findings of fact insofar as they may be inconsistent herewith are reversed, and new findings "are made as indicated herein. The testator, an attorney experienced in Surrogate’s Court practice, drafted his own will in which he provided in subdivision “ (c) ” of paragraph “Eighth” that, upon the death of the life tenant, the trustee is: “ to pay and deliver two hundred shares of General Electric Company stock to my stepson James Lord, Jr. It is my desire that the said stock be such as I hold at the date hereof, or in the event there does not remain in my estate two hundred shares of said stock, I direct that any deficiency be made up at the rate of Thirty-five Dollars per share.” The will is dated January 20, 1953, and testator died on January 7,