National Affairs: Virtue’s Reward

No aged millionaire ever had more solicitous relatives than cantankerous Texan James Sexton, who controlled 378 oil wells and owned 9,000 acres in cattle ranches. The relatives—a sister and four nieces—felt entitled to be watchful, for at 70, James Sexton was acting kind of ornery. That was four years ago, when he was staying at the Cleburne rest home operated by Mrs. Agnes Kirk, then 36. There, one day, he showed his appreciation to Mrs. Kirk by handing her a check for $100,000, showed his affection for her, as well, by getting muscularly amorous. Mrs. Kirk fended him off. Then the relatives stepped in: they stopped payment on the check, withdrew Sexton from the rest home, registered him in another.

James Sexton never forgot his relatives. When he died at 74 early this month, he left a dollar-packed will. To his favorite Cleburne restaurant owner, Bessie Richardson (specialty: black-eyed peas), he left $1,000, and to his attorney he willed $10,000. The rest of his estate went to his relatives and an old friend: $100 apiece to his nieces and sister, $5,000,000 or so to Agnes Kirk.