Hartfords childen in dispute over estate items
Janice Brooks
By KIRK LOGGINS
For The Tennessean
The children of John Hartford, who wrote one of country music's most performed
songs, Gentle On My Mind, are wrangling with his stepchildren and his longtime
business manager over disposition of Hartford's estate.
Hartford, renowned as a singer, songwriter and instrumentalist, died last June
at age 63 after a 21-year struggle with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma.
His wife, Marie Hartford, 67, died in December, a few days after being
diagnosed with lung cancer.
His business manager, California accountant Bernard Saul, yesterday estimated
the value of John Hartford's estate at $3 million.
Hartford's two children have accused Marie Hartford's children of disposing of
personal items that the children say he left to them. Some of those items have
wound up being sold on the eBay Internet auction site by dealers who say they
were purchased at Hartford's ''estate sale.''
''There has been no estate sale by the estate of John Hartford,'' Edwin Pyle,
one of the lawyers representing Hartford's children, said yesterday. ''What
passed to Marie Hartford was the household furnishings. Obviously, these are
not household furnishings.''
One of Marie Hartford's four children, Sherry Bourke, who is serving as
executor of her estate, would not comment when a reporter called her yesterday
at her home in the Triune community of Williamson County.
But attorney Patrick Flynn, who recently began representing Bourke, said, ''My
clients say that there was a yard sale that some things were sold at, but they
were Marie's things.''
John Hartford's children have also questioned whether his business manager put
all of Hartford's songs and performance rights into trusts that he established
in the 1980s.
Marie Hartford received the income from the trusts after her husband's death,
but John Hartford left the principal of the trusts — and most of the rest of
his estate — in equal shares to his two children by a previous marriage,
Jamie Hartford and Kathryn Hogue, and to one of Marie Hartford's grandchildren
by a previous marriage, Dustin Lee Phillips, who is 17.
Dustin Phillips began living with John and Marie Hartford when he was 6, said
Beth Boone, a lawyer appointed as temporary guardian for him. He moved in with
his girlfriend and her family after Marie Hartford's death, Boone said
yesterday.
John Hartford left all his ''musical instruments and equipment'' to his son
Jamie, who is a blues-rock musician. Jamie Hartford did not respond to a
message left yesterday at his home in rural Houston County, Tenn.
Saul said yesterday that Gentle On My Mind, a hit for Glen Campbell in 1967,
had steadily produced about $50,000 a year in royalties. But he said the
biggest assets in Hartford's estate are his interests in two apartment
developments in Florida and Arizona. Hartford's estate is also receiving an
unspecified amount of income from his contributions to the 2000 soundtrack
album from the hit movie O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Lawyers for Jamie Hartford and his sister said they did not file Hartford's
will in Davidson County Probate Court for more than 10 months after his death,
because they could not get the original copy of the document from Saul.
John Hartford had directed in his will that his wife and Bernard Saul be named
co-executors of his estate, or, if they were unable or unwilling to serve, that
his friend, Nashville guitar dealer George Gruhn and Saul's daughter, Elaine
Lasseff, be co-executors instead.
But Jamie Hartford and Hogue asked Probate Judge Frank Clement Jr. in the
probate petition they filed in April not to appoint Saul or Lasseff ''due to
their having interests which are adverse to interests of the estate.''
''There was some confusion about just which envelope which assets went into''
in Saul's office, Pyle said yesterday. ''The distance probably complicated
that.''
Pyle's co-counsel, Rose Palermo, said they had ''many months of an exchange of
correspondence'' with California attorneys representing Saul and Lasseff before
they could get the original copy of John Hartford's will.
''We were very anxious to get an executor appointed so that someone with
authority could enter onto the premises (the Hartfords' home on Falls Avenue in
Madison) and take charge of the assets that were to pass under John's will, not
under Marie's,'' Palermo said. ''After Mr. Saul and Ms. Lasseff secured local
counsel, we were able to reach an agreement about the probating of the will
rather quickly.''
Saul said yesterday that there was ''no problem'' with his management of John
Hartford's affairs.
''Right now, there's a lot of attorneys involved,'' Saul said. ''That slows up
the process. When people are watching every move you make, you move a little
slower.''
Clement named Gruhn executor of John Hartford's estate on May 17 and gave him
60 days to file an inventory of the assets.
Gruhn would not comment yesterday on the case.
BUS Janice http://www.geocities.com/Nashville/3886/index.html
Moderator(country music) Steel Guitar Forum
http://www.steelguitarforum.com/
Barbara Sherrill
it out somehow.
Barb
"Janice Brooks" <busga...@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20020621231854...@mb-co.aol.com...
> but John Hartford left the principal of the trusts - and most of the rest
of
> his estate - in equal shares to his two children by a previous marriage,