Unusual Wills
Your cheap will is constructed to help your loved ones organise the disposal of your estate when you’ve moved on. Whilst yours may be simple, here are one or two unusual ones.
Will’s The Last Laugh
It makes sense to make a will. The majority of us know that, but actually getting around to it seems such a hassle. How much consideration went in these “wills with a difference”?
Even the celebrated magician and escapologist, Harry Houdini, couldn’t escape death. Having perished from a ruptured appendix, one of his biggest shocks came with the will reading. His magicians equipment went to his former partner Theodore, who was also his brother. His magical skills didn’t work on the next section – his appreciable collection of writings on magic and the occult. He left these to the American Society for Psychical Research, but with the condition that their research officer J Malcolm Bird, who also was the editor of their journal, resigned. They turned down the offer the compilation was given to the Library of Congress.
The trained rabbits that he used in his performance left their hats and were given to the children of friends. Continuing the unusual theme, his left his spouse ten words, which was a secret code, with the assurance that he would use these words to reach her from the afterlife. Every year for 10 years, following his death, she faithfully held séances, but Harry never made contact.
Kozmic Blues and rock singer Janis Joplin had a brief but notable history. She made many rock anthems and four albums, including “To Love Somebody” and “Me and Bobby McGee”. After years of drugs and drink, she passed away from an overdose, aged 27. Two days prior to her death in 1970 her online wills the figure of $2,500 to fund an all night wake at her favourite pub so that her friends could “get blasted after I’m gone.” It must have been some wake – that was a large amount of money back in 1970.
We’ve all read about people that, randomly, leave all their estate to the dogs’ home, much to the disbelief of their family. Lot’s of family feuds begin when a will is read. As long as there is no reason to doubt the clear thinking and freewill of the person when the will is written, there is often little that can be done to object to such a decision.
Quirks apart, if you pass on without leaving a will, the people whom you would wish to inherit will not necessarily be the ones that do so. You might have a partner of many years, but if you’re not married or in a legal partnership, he or she won’t get your money, in spite of your intentions and assurances. This can be upsetting when it’s not clearly stated and can result in devastating fiscal consequences.
The current way to get your will under way is to search online and source a online cheap wills . However basic your wishes are, it’s advisable to have the professionals to write it for you and you can be confident that you’re leaving things exactly how you would wish them to be.