University of Manitoba granted with Millions from Estate

Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009

In its 131 years of existence, University of Manitoba recently received the largest bequest throughout its history.  The money, $7 million, will ensure that its university library purchases more books.

William and Margaret Strobie gave the gift.  They taught English literature at the university for decades and they want to instill the love of books to young professors and thousands of students.  When Margaret died in 1990 and her husband, William, followed in 2007, he decided to leave their Inuit art, papers, book collection, and a fortune of stocks to the school.

In 2003, William Stobie contacted the university and made an initial outright gift specifically for the library to have an endowment fund and buy books in their name.  The director of planned giving, Beth Proven, met him in 2005 and said, “Before he even talked with anybody, that’s already his wish.  It’s the largest one I ever came across with.”

“Strobie’s wish was very specific,” Proven added.  The money should go into buying books for specific areas of Slavic studies, French, German, Italian, Spanish, English literature, philosophy, and the classics.  It was estimated that the estate will most likely generate $315,000 interest every year to buy these books.

Tags: bequest, books, endowment fund, gift, Margaret Strobie, Planned Giving, University of Manitoba, William Strobie
Posted in Planned Giving | No Comments »

Legal Terms in a Will

Saturday, June 20th, 2009

You’ve probably watched this scene in a movie - a family sits in an office while an attorney reads a last will and testament from their wealthy grandfather.  And then it reads “Being of sound body and mind, I, Reginald V. Gotrocks, hereby bequeath all my fortune and possessions to one person who’s been there for me rain or shine, day in or day out…..my mailman Jim.”

The next thing that would happen is that the family may vow to contest the crazy will of the old man.  Unfortunately, if the will has been properly drafted, it’s one of the iron-clad documents in law.

The truth is that everyone of legal age should have a will.  If not, the court will never know how you intend to dispose your possessions - be it land, money, computer, or your pet cat.

It’s also important to know the legal terms in a will:

• Testator - person who owns the will
• Executor - person who’ll carry it out
• Beneficiary - recipient of the  assets
• Probate - court that will prove the will’s validity
• Bequest - gift of personal property coming from testator to beneficiary
• Codicil - written amendment to the will
• Intestate - a person have died without a will (opposite of “testate”)
• Trust - entity holding assets until later, which also allows the beneficiary to bypass probate.
• .

Tags: attorney, beneficiary, bequest, codicil, court, executor, intestate, probate, testator, trust, will, will and testament
Posted in Wills | No Comments »