YT YouTube2Text

YouTube2Text → Transcripts → I Found A Bank Receipt In My Late Mother's Purse. The Balance Showed $67 Million

I Found A Bank Receipt In My Late Mother's Purse. The Balance Showed $67 Million — Transcript

by Kate's Fortune Stories · 8,854 words · 1,239 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

Open in transcriber Summarize with AI Download SRT/VTT

Full transcript

0:00I found a bank receipt folded inside the
0:03torn lining of my late mother's purse.
0:05The balance printed at the bottom was
0:08$67 million. My mother scrubbed office
0:11floors at night for 38 years, and the
0:14winter my furnace died. She told me she
0:17had $300 to her name. When I took that
0:20receipt to the bank, the young teller
0:22read the name on the account, turned
0:24white as paper, and pressed a button
0:26under the counter. Welcome to Kate's
0:29Fortune Stories. It's Kate again, and
0:32I'm so happy you're here with me. Before
0:34we begin, please subscribe to the
0:37channel and give this video a like, and
0:39tell me in the comments what city you're
0:41watching from. I always love seeing how
0:44far these stories travel. Don't forget
0:46to subscribe because this story is only
0:49just beginning. People think a purse is
0:52just a bag. It isn't. A woman's purse is
0:55a diary she never writes down. Every
0:58receipt, every folded note, every cough
1:00drop and safety pin is a sentence from a
1:03day you weren't there for. When my
1:05mother died, I couldn't open hers for 3
1:08months. I was afraid of what I'd find. I
1:11was right to be afraid. I was just
1:13afraid of the wrong thing. My name is
1:16Joan Mercer. Everyone calls me Joe. I'm
1:1954 years old and I live in the lower
1:22half of a green duplex in Duth,
1:24Minnesota up the hill from Lake
1:26Superior. For 22 years, I have driven a
1:29yellow school bus for the Duth Public
1:31Schools, Route 14, 41 stops, and a
1:36little boy named Matteo, who has told me
1:38a knock-k knockock joke every single
1:40morning since the second grade. My
1:42mother's name was Dolores Mercer. To the
1:45whole world, she was Dolly. She was 80
1:48years old when she died last August,
1:51alone in her recliner in her one-bedroom
1:53apartment on East Fourth Street, with a
1:55television on and her old brown purse
1:58sitting on her lap, both hands resting
2:01on top of it the way she always held it.
2:03The doctor said her heart simply
2:06stopped. My mother cleaned offices
2:09nights for 38 years. She cleaned the
2:12Harbor Light building on Superior
2:14Street. She started at 6:00 in the
2:16evening and finished at 2:00 in the
2:18morning. She took the city bus home in
2:20the dark. She did it the week my father
2:23died. My father was Eddie Mercer. He was
2:26a deck hand on an iron or frighter
2:29called the Cyrus J Holloway. And in
2:32November of 1977,
2:34a storm came across the lake so fast the
2:36weather service couldn't warn anyone.
2:39The Holloway went down off the Kiwana
2:41Peninsula with 19 men aboard. They never
2:44found my father. I was 5 years old. My
2:47brother Ray was two. The union paid my
2:50mother a death benefit of $6,000 and
2:53that was it. That was everything she got
2:55for her husband. So, we were poor. I say
2:58it because everything that happens in
3:00this story depends on you understanding
3:02just how poor. My mother bought our
3:05coats at St. Vincent, Delaware, Paul.
3:08She kept a coffee can on top of the
3:10refrigerator labeled emergencies. And I
3:13don't think there was ever more than $40
3:14in it. When I was grown, it didn't get
3:17better for her. It got quieter. She went
3:20deaf in her left ear in her 60s. And the
3:23aiologist told her a good pair of
3:24hearing aids would cost $4,200.
3:29She laughed and said, "I hear what I
3:31need to hear." For 15 years, she turned
3:34her head to the right whenever anyone
3:36spoke to her, and she pretended that was
3:39just a habit. And then there was my
3:41daughter, Lily. Lily was accepted into
3:44the nursing program at the University of
3:45Minnesota when she was 18. But I was a
3:48divorced bus driver and the financial
3:50aid letter left a gap of $19,000 a year.
3:54I sat at my mother's kitchen table and
3:56cried. My mother held my hand and said,
3:59"Honey, if I had it, it would be yours.
4:02You know that I have nothing." Lily went
4:05to community college instead. She worked
4:08nights at a nursing home. It took her 8
4:11years to finish her degree. And she
4:13still owes $41,000 in loans. That was
4:16our family. Hardwork, stubborn, always
4:20one broken furnace away from disaster.
4:23There's one more person you need to know
4:26about before I open that purse. My
4:28little brother, Ry. Rey was the charming
4:31one. He had my father's smile and none
4:34of my mother's caution. He moved to Fort
4:36Meyers, Florida when he was 23 and he
4:39never really came back. He called our
4:41mother on her birthday and on Christmas
4:44and usually somewhere in the middle of
4:45the call, his voice would change and
4:47he'd ask if she could spare a little
4:49something until the end of the month and
4:51she always found a little something. I
4:53never knew where she found it. When mom
4:56died, Ry flew up for the funeral. He
4:59cried harder than I did at the
5:00graveside. And then that same evening in
5:03the parking lot of the funeral home, he
5:05asked me a question that I didn't think
5:07about again until much later. He asked,
5:10"Joe, where's mom's purse?" I told him
5:13the funeral home had given me her
5:15personal effects in a cardboard box. He
5:17nodded. Keep it safe, okay? Don't throw
5:20anything out. Don't let anybody go
5:23through it. I thought it was grief. Rey
5:26had never been sentimental about
5:28anything in his life. There was
5:29something else that happened at the
5:31funeral and I need to tell you about it
5:33now. A man came to the service that
5:36nobody recognized. He was in his late
5:3850s, maybe 60, tall and lean with silver
5:41hair and a camel colored overcoat that
5:44probably cost more than my bus. And when
5:46the service ended, he came over to me in
5:48the vestibule, took my hand in both of
5:50his and said, "I'm so very sorry, Miss
5:53Mercer. Your mother was a remarkable
5:56woman." On the little finger of his
5:58right hand, he wore a heavy gold signate
6:01ring with a letter A engraved on its
6:04face. He gave me a business card, Conrad
6:07Vale, Veil Advisory Group, Minneapolis.
6:11He told me he represented a family who
6:13had known my mother many years ago. He
6:15said my mother had kept some old
6:17paperwork that belonged to his client,
6:20documents of purely sentimental value,
6:22and his client would be grateful to buy
6:24them back. As a courtesy, he said,
6:27"$25,000
6:29whenever you feel ready. There's no
6:31hurry at all." $25,000
6:34for old paper. I put the card in my
6:37pocket and forgot about it. Mr. Veil
6:40didn't forget about me. He called in
6:42September. He called again in October.
6:45Each time he was gentle and patient and
6:47very polite. Each time he raised the
6:50number. By October it was $60,000.
6:53My mother's estate, as far as I
6:55understood it, was nothing. There was a
6:57simple, well, she'd written years ago,
7:00leaving everything to Ray and me. There
7:02was a checking account with $812
7:05in it. There was a burial policy that
7:08covered the funeral. The landlord gave
7:10me until November to clear out the
7:12apartment. So, on the first Saturday in
7:14November, I drove to East Fourth Street
7:16with a roll of garbage bags and a heart
7:19like a stone. I packed the coffee can
7:22from the top of the refrigerator, still
7:24labeled emergencies, which held $11 and
7:27a stack of folded papers I didn't have
7:30the strength to read. And then finally,
7:32I sat down in her recliner and I opened
7:34the cardboard box from the funeral home,
7:37and I took out her purse. It was brown
7:39leather, scuffed, nearly white at the
7:42corners. The clasp had broken years ago,
7:45and she held it closed with a thick blue
7:47rubber band from the newspaper. I took
7:50off the rubber band. Inside, I found a
7:52plastic rain bonnet, a rosary, three
7:54butterscotch candies, a city bus
7:57transfer, a lipstick worn down to the
7:59metal, and a small brass key on a ring
8:02with a paper tag that said LF214.
8:05And then I noticed the lining along the
8:07bottom. The old satin lining had a tear,
8:10and somebody had sewn it closed again
8:12with black thread badly in big uneven
8:15stitches. My mother was a beautiful
8:18seamstress. She would never have sewn
8:20anything that badly unless she was in a
8:22hurry or unless her hands were shaking.
8:25I took my car keys and cut the stitches.
8:28Behind the lining, flat against the
8:30leather, was a folded slip of thermal
8:33paper. It was a bank receipt, Lakeshore
8:35Fidelity Bank, Superior Street, Duth. An
8:38account balance inquiry dated June 24th,
8:427 weeks before she died. The account was
8:45listed as Dolores M. Mercer payable on
8:48death to Joan R. Mercer. My name and at
8:53the bottom in plain faded numbers was
8:55the available balance. 67,284,5196.
9:04I read it four times and then I turned
9:06it over and on the back in my mother's
9:09handwriting there are four lines written
9:12in blue ballpoint pen. Joe, if something
9:15happens to me, do not sign anything a
9:18man with a gold ring brings you. Go to
9:20Mr. Iverson at the bank. Only Mr.
9:23Iverson. I'm sorry, honey. I was going
9:26to tell you on my birthday. My mother's
9:29birthday was September 2nd. She died on
9:32August 19th. I sat in her recliner until
9:35the room went dark. A man with a gold
9:38ring. I took Conrad Vale's business card
9:42out of my wallet. where it had been
9:44sitting since the funeral, and I laid it
9:46on the arm of the chair next to the
9:48receipt. My hands started to shake so
9:51badly I had to sit on them. On Monday
9:53morning, I called in sick for the first
9:55time in 4 years, put on my Good Navy
9:58blazer, and drove downtown to Lakeshore
10:00Fidelity Bank. I went to the first
10:03teller window. The teller was a young
10:05woman, maybe 25, with a name tag that
10:07said Kayla. I slid the receipt across
10:10the counter and told her I was here
10:12about my late mother's account and that
10:15I needed to speak to Mr. Iverson. Kayla
10:18smiled and picked up the receipt. She
10:20looked at the account number. She typed
10:23something into her computer and then her
10:25smile disappeared. I watched the color
10:28leave her face from the forehead down
10:31like water draining from a sink. She
10:34looked at her screen. She looked at me
10:36and then without a word her right hand
10:39moved under the counter and I heard a
10:42very small click. "Ma'am," she said and
10:45her voice was trembling. "Would you mind
10:47waiting in our lobby for just a few
10:49minutes?" I didn't understand. I sat
10:52down in a leather chair by the window
10:54and waited. For minutes later, two Duth
10:58police officers walked through the brass
11:00doors and came straight to me. They were
11:02very polite while they asked me to stand
11:04up, asked for my identification, and
11:07asked me to come with them to a
11:09conference room in the back. I sat at a
11:11long wooden table with my purse on my
11:13lap, holding it exactly the way my
11:15mother used to hold hers, and I realized
11:17that I was being detained. Me, a school
11:20bus driver who had never gotten so much
11:23as a parking ticket. 20 minutes later,
11:25the door opened and a man came in
11:28carrying a thick manila folder. He was
11:30in his late 40s, broad-shouldered in a
11:33gray suit and a Minnesota Vikings tie
11:36with closecropped hair going white at
11:38the temples and the calmst eyes I have
11:39ever seen. He sat down across from me
11:42and set the folder on the table without
11:44opening it. Ms. Mercer, he said. I'm
11:47Detective Sergeant Wendel Lasani, Duth
11:50Police Financial Crimes. I've been
11:52waiting for someone to walk into this
11:54bank with that receipt for about 6
11:56weeks. I have to be honest with you. I
11:59did not expect it to be you. I asked him
12:02what was going on. He didn't answer.
12:04Instead, he asked me where I had gotten
12:06the receipt. I told him the purse, the
12:09lining, the black thread. He asked me
12:12whether I had ever been to a law office
12:13in St. Paul called Fairon and Lel. He
12:17asked me whether I knew a notary public
12:19named Harold Dempsey. He asked me
12:22whether I had ever heard of something
12:24called the Ammonson Heart Foundation. I
12:27answered no and no and no, and every no
12:30sounded weaker than the one before it.
12:32Then he opened the folder and slid a
12:34document across the table. It was a
12:36will, the last will and testament of
12:38Dolores M. Mercer, dated June 3rd of
12:42this year. It left everything my mother
12:44owned, including all funds held at
12:47Lakeshore Fidelity Bank to the Ammonson
12:50Heart Foundation of Minneapolis. My name
12:52wasn't in it. Ray's name wasn't in it.
12:55It was signed with my mother's name,
12:58witnessed by two strangers, and stamped
13:00by a notary named Harold Dempsey.
13:03Somebody presented this will to the bank
13:05in September, Detective Assandi said,
13:08along with a request to transfer the
13:10full balance to the foundation's
13:12account. The bank's private client
13:15manager refused. He thought something
13:17was wrong with it. So did I. But I have
13:20to consider every possibility, Ms.
13:22Mercer, including the possibility that
13:24someone in your mother's family wrote
13:25this and then got cold feet and is now
13:28trying something else. I didn't write
13:31that, I said. I didn't know there was
13:33any money. I drive a school bus. He
13:36looked at me for a long, long moment.
13:38Then he said, "I believe you, but belief
13:42isn't evidence. Do you have a lawyer?"
13:45I didn't. I had never needed one. And
13:48then I remembered a business card I had
13:50found that morning in the zippered
13:52pocket of my mother's purse. Augustus
13:55Vanderwarf, attorney at law. Estates and
13:58probate. Duth. On the back in my
14:01mother's handwriting, it said, "Gus,
14:04July 11th, 200 p.m." I asked the
14:07detective if I could make a call. He
14:09nodded and slid his phone across the
14:11table. Gus Vanderwarf was 74 years old.
14:15He arrived 40 minutes later in a rumpled
14:17brown corduroy jacket with a bow tie, a
14:20cane he obviously didn't need, and a
14:22leather briefcase so old it had been
14:24mended with duct tape. He looked at the
14:26police officers, then at me. You're
14:29Dolly's girl, he said. You've got her
14:31chin. Then he turned to the detective.
14:35Wendell, he said because it turned out
14:37they knew each other. Everyone in Duth
14:39knows each other eventually. This woman
14:42is my client as of right now. And before
14:44you say another word, you're going to
14:47want to see what's in my briefcase. He
14:49opened it and laid a document on the
14:51table beside the other will. It was also
14:54titled the last will and testament of
14:56Dolores M. Mercer. It was dated July
14:5911th. It left everything to me and to my
15:02brother Raymond in equal shares, and it
15:06named me as the executive, and it had
15:08one more paragraph, a paragraph Gus told
15:11us my mother had insisted on writing
15:13herself, word for word. I have never
15:16been to any law office in St. Paul. I
15:19have never signed any will in favor of
15:21the Ammonson Heart Foundation or any
15:23other foundation. If any such document
15:26appears after my death, it is a forgery,
15:29and I ask the police to find out who
15:31made it. The rune was completely silent.
15:35She came to my office in July, Gus said
15:37quietly. I'd known her since 1978.
15:41I'm the young lawyer who fought the
15:43shipping company for her after the
15:45hallway went down. We lost. They paid
15:48$6,000 and not a penny more. And this
15:51summer she walked into my office, sat
15:53down, and said, "Gus, I think somebody
15:55is going to try to steal from my
15:56children after I'm gone. I want to make
15:58it impossible." Detective Asanti picked
16:02up the forged will. He read the
16:04paragraph from my mother's will. He
16:06looked at the notary stamp. Harold
16:08Dempsey, he said. I ran that name last
16:11week. Harold Dempsey of St. Paul was a
16:14real notary public. He died of a heart
16:17attack in March of last year. 14 months
16:20before he supposedly stamped this will,
16:23a dead man had notorized my mother's
16:25forgery, and I was sitting at the table
16:27with both documents in front of me, and
16:30I finally understood why the teller had
16:33pressed that button. Then the door
16:34opened again, and an elderly man walked
16:37in, out of breath. When he saw me, he
16:40stopped and his eyes filled with tears.
16:43"Oh," he said. "Oh, it's you. You drive
16:46the bus. Route 14. This was Arin
16:50Iverson, senior private client manager
16:53of Lakeshore Fidelity Bank. And he knew
16:55who I was because he told me my mother
16:58had shown him pictures of me every time
17:00she came in. Pictures of me standing
17:03beside my bus. Pictures of Lily at her
17:06nursing pinning ceremony. She was so
17:08proud of you both, he said. She would
17:10tap the photograph with her finger and
17:12say that one has never asked me for a
17:15single thing in her life. And with Gus
17:18beside me and the detective across the
17:20table, Aron Iverson told me where $67
17:24million had come from. It started in
17:261981, for years after my father drowned.
17:30In 1981, my mother cleaned the sixth
17:33floor of the Harbor Light building. At
17:35the very end of the hallway was a tiny
17:38office barely bigger than a closet,
17:41rented by a young engineer named Felix
17:43Ammonson. Felix was 34. His wife had
17:47died the year before of a heart
17:48arhythmia that no one had caught in
17:50time, and he had become obsessed with
17:52building a small portable monitor that
17:54could warn a person before their heart
17:56went wrong. He worked there day and
17:58night. He slept on the floor under his
18:00desk. My mother found him there night
18:03after night. At first, she just emptied
18:06his waste basket around him. Then she
18:09started leaving a thermos of soup on his
18:11desk, chicken and wild rice every
18:14Tuesday and Thursday. Then she started
18:17sitting for 5 minutes on her break and
18:20he would explain his circuit boards to
18:22her and she would nod and not understand
18:24a word. In December of 1981, the bank
18:27that had loaned Felix money to build his
18:30first prototype called the loan. He owed
18:33$6,000 by the end of the month or they
18:35would seize his equipment, his designs,
18:37everything. He told my mother this one
18:40night, sitting on the floor of his
18:41office, and he cried. And my mother went
18:44home, took the union's death benefit for
18:47my father out of her savings account.
18:49All of it, every dollar she had in the
18:52world, and gave it to Felix Ammonson in
18:54an envelope. Felix tried to refuse. She
18:57wouldn't let him. So Felix did the only
19:00thing he could think of. He took out a
19:02piece of company letterhead and wrote
19:04her a stock certificate by hand.
19:07Ammonson Cardiac Systems, 3% of the
19:10company issued to Dolores M. Mercer in
19:13exchange for $6,000. And he wrote at the
19:16bottom 112 thermoses of soup. He signed
19:21it. He dated it. And he recorded it in
19:23the company's shareholder ledger in his
19:26own hand, the way the law required. Your
19:29mother told me she put that certificate
19:31in a coffee can, Arin said, and didn't
19:34look at it for 20 years. She assumed it
19:37was worthless. She assumed she'd simply
19:39given her money away to a sad young man,
19:42and she was at peace with that. She
19:44said, "Ar, you don't give a gift and
19:46then sit around waiting for it to come
19:48back." Ammonson Cardiac Systems did not
19:51become famous. It stayed small and
19:54private for decades, building heart
19:56monitors for hospitals across the
19:57Midwest. He remarried, had a son, and
20:00died in 2009. And when he died, his son
20:04took over the company. The son's name
20:06was Henrik Amonson. And last year, a
20:09giant medical device company called
20:11Meridian Medtec bought Amonson Cardiac
20:14Systems for $2.2 billion. When a company
20:18is bought or unexplained, every
20:20shareholder has to be found and paid.
20:23Meridian's lawyers went through the
20:25company's records all the way back to
20:281981. And in Felix Ammonson's original
20:31handwritten ledger, they found a line
20:34that didn't appear in any of Henrik's
20:36modern records. Dolores M. Mercer 3%. In
20:41May of this year, they flew her to
20:43Minneapolis, verified her original
20:45certificate, and paid her. After taxes,
20:48$67 million, deposited into an account
20:52she opened at Lakes Shore Fidelity with
20:54Arin Iverson himself. She sat in my
20:56office the day the money arrived, Arin
20:59said. She looked at the number for a
21:00long time and then she asked me if the
21:03bank had any coffee and I brought her a
21:04cup and she held it in both hands and
21:07said, "I wonder if this is enough for
21:09hearing aids." I laughed. I laughed so
21:13hard it turned into crying in the
21:15conference room and none of them said a
21:17word. They just let me. When I could
21:19breathe again, Detective Asani leaned
21:22forward. Ms. Mercer, he said, your
21:25mother's name was missing from Henrik
21:27Amonson's records. Not accidentally. We
21:31think Henrik took her shares off the
21:33books years ago and counted them as his
21:35own. When Meridian found that ledger,
21:38Henrik lost $67 million he believed was
21:41his. And a few weeks after your mother
21:43died, a forged will showed up trying to
21:46send every penny of it to a foundation
21:49in Minneapolis. a foundation whose board
21:52chairman is Henrik Amonson. The man with
21:55the gold ring, I whispered, and I took
21:58out Conrad Vale's business card and laid
22:01it on the table. The detective looked at
22:03the card. Conrad Vale, he said, is a
22:06private investigator and what you might
22:08politely call a problem solver. His
22:10largest client for the past 11 years has
22:13been Ammonson Cardiac Systems. Has he
22:16contacted you? I told him everything.
22:19Then he asked me the question I had been
22:22dreading. Miss Mercer, has anyone in
22:24your own family been asking about your
22:26mother's papers?
22:28I thought of the funeral home parking
22:30lot. Joe, where's mom's purse? Keep it
22:33safe. Don't let anybody go through it.
22:36My brother, I said, Ray. The detective
22:39closed his notebook very slowly. He
22:42didn't say anything. He didn't have to.
22:44That night, Gus drove me home and gave
22:47me one rule. Tell no one. Not my
22:50friends, not my daughter, not my
22:52brother. And if Conrad Vale called, "Be
22:55polite, be tired, and say I was still
22:57thinking." The next morning, Gus and I
23:00went back to Lakeshore Fidelity with a
23:02little brass key. LF214.
23:05It was a safe deposit box rented in my
23:08mother's name in June. Inside the long
23:10metal box, there were three things. The
23:13first was the original stock certificate
23:16from 1981 on yellowed letterhead in
23:19Felix Ammonson's handwriting. 112
23:23thermoses of soup. The second was a
23:26letter from Felix to my mother dated
23:291982 thanking her. It ended Dolly. If
23:33this company ever becomes anything, it
23:35will be because a woman with a mop
23:37believed in a man on the floor. Never
23:39let anyone tell you otherwise. Never let
23:42anyone buy this back from you. The third
23:44thing was an envelope with my name on
23:46it. Joe, if you're reading this, I
23:49didn't get to tell you on my birthday,
23:51and I'm sorry. I wanted to drive out to
23:54Brighton Beach with you and Lily and sit
23:56on the rocks and tell you a story about
23:58soup. Here is the story. I gave away
24:01your father's money when you were nine,
24:03to a man I barely knew, and I never told
24:06you because I was ashamed of how foolish
24:08it was. All those years I said I had
24:11nothing. I was telling the truth. I
24:14thought I had nothing. Then this spring,
24:17the foolish thing turned out to be the
24:19best thing I ever did. And then in July,
24:22a man came to my apartment, Felix's son,
24:25Henrik. He wore his father's ring. He
24:28had papers for me to sign, giving
24:30everything to his foundation. He said a
24:33cleaning woman wouldn't know what to do
24:35with that kind of money. I told him to
24:37get out of my kitchen. He smiled when he
24:40left. I didn't like his smile, so I've
24:43done what I can. Gus has my will. Arin
24:46has my account. You have the key. Don't
24:48let them buy you, honey. And don't let
24:50them scare you. I love you more than the
24:53lake is deep. Mom, under her signature,
24:57she had added one more line in smaller
24:59handwriting. P.S. Ask about the
25:02dividends. Something isn't right. I
25:05didn't understand that line. Not yet. I
25:08folded the letter, put it inside my
25:10blazer over my heart, and walked out of
25:13that vault a different woman than the
25:15one who had walked in. 3 days later,
25:17Detective Asani called and asked me to
25:20come to the police station on West First
25:22Street. In his office, he turned his
25:25computer monitor toward me. It was a
25:28still image from a security camera in
25:30the bar of a hotel in Canal Park. It was
25:33dated October 2nd. Two men were sitting
25:36at a corner table. One of them was
25:39Conrad Vale, his gold ring catching the
25:42light. The other one was my brother Ray,
25:45leaning in close, his elbows on the
25:48table, the way he always leaned in when
25:50he was selling something. Conrad Vale
25:53called the next Tuesday. I let it ring
25:55three times like Gus told me. Then I
25:58answered with the most tired voice I
26:00had. And then carefully he told me that
26:02his client had authorized a final offer,
26:06$250,000,
26:09a cashier's check for my mother's old
26:11paperwork and for my signature on a
26:14simple document acknowledging that the
26:16foundation's claim to the account should
26:18be respected according to your mother's
26:20wishes. A quarter of a million dollars
26:24for 67 million for my mother's soup. I
26:27told him I needed to think. He said, "Of
26:30course," he said. Ms. Mercer, there's a
26:32will. It's in the foundation's favor.
26:35The courts will likely uphold it
26:37eventually. This way, you walk away with
26:40something. The other way, you spend
26:43yours and every dollar you have on
26:45lawyers, and you walk away with nothing.
26:48Then he said goodbye in the kindest
26:50voice in the world. I called Gus. Gus
26:54called Detective Asani. And that
26:56afternoon in the back room of Gus's
26:58office above an old hardware store on
27:00Central Avenue. The detective explained
27:03what he wanted. Vale is careful. He
27:05said, "If I arrest him now, he'll say he
27:08was a consultant for a charity, and
27:10Henrik will say he never saw that will.
27:12I want them both. I want the man who
27:14made that will, and I want the man who
27:17sent him.
27:18What do you need? I asked. I need you to
27:22say yes, he said. I need Veil in your
27:25kitchen with that check in one hand and
27:27that document in the other believing
27:29he's won. Men like Conrad Vale talk the
27:33most right at the moment. They think
27:34it's over. Gus put his hand on my arm.
27:38Joe, you don't have to do this. The
27:40money is protected either way. I thought
27:43about my mother turning her head to the
27:45right for 15 years so nobody would
27:47notice she couldn't hear. And I thought
27:50about Henrik Amonson in her kitchen,
27:52telling her a cleaning woman wouldn't
27:54know what to do with money. Tell me what
27:56to say, I said. We set the meeting for a
27:59Saturday morning, the third Saturday in
28:01November at my duplex. On Friday night,
28:04two technicians from the police
28:05department came to my house and
28:07installed tiny cameras in the kitchen
28:09light fixture and a microphone the size
28:11of a button under my kitchen table.
28:14Detective Asani would be in my upstairs
28:16neighbor's apartment along with three
28:18officers. At 9:58 on Saturday morning, a
28:22black Mercedes pulled up in front of my
28:24duplex. Conrad Vale stepped out in his
28:28camel overcoat carrying a slim leather
28:31portfolio. I opened the door and he
28:34smiled at me as if we were old friends.
28:36I made coffee. I put out a plate of my
28:39mother's oatmeal cookies. He sat at my
28:42kitchen table right over the button
28:44microphone and opened his portfolio.
28:46Inside was a cashier's check for
28:49$250,000
28:51drawn on a bank in Minneapolis and made
28:53out to Joanne R. Mercer and a three-page
28:57document titled disclaimer and release
28:59of interest. He walked me through it
29:02page by page in his warm, patient voice.
29:06By signing, I would acknowledge the June
29:083rd will as my mother's true and final
29:11wishes. I would release any claim to the
29:14account at Lakeshore Fidelity. I would
29:16agree to hand over any and all original
29:19documents relating to Ammonson cardiac
29:21systems in my possession. I had been
29:24told to make him explain. So I asked in
29:26my most confused bus driver voice, "Mr.
29:30veil. I don't understand. Why would my
29:32mother leave all her money to a
29:34foundation she never once mentioned to
29:36me? He sighed and then he made his first
29:39mistake. Ms. Mercer, he said, between
29:42you and me, your mother didn't leave
29:45that money to anyone. That money was
29:47never supposed to be hers. It was a
29:50clerical accident, a scrap of paper from
29:521981 that Felix Ammonson should never
29:55have written. Henrik has spent 40 years
29:59building that company. He wasn't about
30:01to hand 3% of it to a janitor because
30:03his father felt sorry for her. But the
30:06will, I said, my lawyer says my mother
30:09wrote a different will. He smiled the
30:12way you smile at a child. Wills are
30:15complicated things. They're just paper.
30:18Paper can say whatever you need it to
30:19say if you have the right notary. The
30:22notary who was dead, I said. It slipped
30:25out. I hadn't meant to say it. For one
30:28terrible second, the kitchen was
30:30absolutely silent, and Conrad Vale
30:32looked at me, and his smile didn't move,
30:35but his eyes did. They went very still,
30:37like a cat's eyes when something moves
30:40in the grass. And then he laughed. "Your
30:42lawyer has been busy," he said. "Yes,
30:45poor Harold. Henrik's people were
30:47careless with that detail. I told them
30:49to use someone alive. But it doesn't
30:52matter, Ms. Mercer. By the time anyone
30:55proves anything, you'll have spent 5
30:57years and every penny you have. Henrik
31:01has $2 billion. You have a school bus.
31:04He pushed the pen across the table.
31:07Sign. Take the check. Buy your daughter
31:09a car. That's what your mother would
31:11really want. I picked up the pen. I
31:15signed my name at the bottom of page
31:16three. Slowly, neatly. Joanne R. Mercer.
31:21Then I reached under the table, took out
31:23a manila envelope, and slid it across to
31:26him. The papers, I said, inside was a
31:29photocopy of the 1981 certificate. The
31:32original was still in safe deposit box
31:35214.
31:37Under Aron Iverson's watchful eye, Vale
31:40opened the envelope, glanced at the
31:42photocopy, and nodded with satisfaction.
31:44Then he said, almost to himself, he'll
31:47be relieved. He's been trying to get
31:49this paper back from her since 1999.
31:53And then my back door opened. It wasn't
31:55Detective Asani. It was Rey. My brother
31:58walked into my kitchen in a gray hooded
32:01sweatshirt and jeans, his face pale, his
32:04hands in his pockets. Behind him, coming
32:07down the back stairs, was Detective
32:09Asani, and behind the detective, two
32:11uniformed officers. Conrad Vale stood up
32:15so fast his chair fell over backward.
32:17Raymond Vale said his voice had changed
32:21completely. What are you doing here?
32:23Finishing the job you gave me, Conrad.
32:26My brother said you wanted mom's papers.
32:29The police have had copies of everything
32:32you ever gave me since September.
32:35Detective Asani stepped forward. Conrad
32:38Vale, you are under arrest for forgery,
32:41theft by swindle, conspiracy to commit
32:44theft, and attempted financial
32:46exploitation.
32:47One of the officers took Vale's arm.
32:50Vale didn't struggle. He just stood
32:53there in my kitchen in his beautiful
32:55camel coat, looking at the plate of
32:57oatmeal cookies as if he couldn't
32:59understand how they had beaten him. I
33:01was looking at my brother. Rey was
33:03looking back at me and then my little
33:05brother, who I had believed for three
33:07weeks, was the man who had sold out her
33:09mother, put his face in his hands and
33:11started to cry. Detective Asanti bagged
33:14the check and the sign disclaimer,
33:16looked at the two of us, and stepped out
33:18onto the porch. Ry sat down at my table,
33:22and he told me in July, 3 weeks before
33:25she died, our mother had called him in
33:28Florida. She told him there was money
33:29now, a lot of money, and that she
33:31couldn't explain on the phone. And then
33:33she said, "Raymond, listen to me. If a
33:36man named Veil ever calls you, you hang
33:39up and you watch out for your sister."
33:42Ry thought she was just confused. He
33:44said, "Sure, Ma." And changed the
33:46subject. 3 weeks later, she was gone. In
33:50September, Conrad Vale called him. He
33:52had done his research. He knew Ry was
33:55behind on his rent. He offered Rey
33:58$500,000 to help him get mom's papers
34:00from me and to testify if necessary that
34:04mom had talked about wanting to leave
34:05her money to charity. He thought I was
34:08the weak one, Ray said. And he was
34:10right, Joe. For about 20 minutes, he was
34:12right. I sat in my apartment and thought
34:15about what half a million dollars would
34:17do. And then he remembered his mother's
34:20voice on the phone. You watch out for
34:23your sister. The next morning, Ry called
34:26the Duth Police Department and asked for
34:28whoever handled fraud. He got detective
34:31Wendel Asani. It was Ray's call in part
34:34that led Assani to ask Ron Iverson to
34:37flag the account so that anyone who came
34:39asking about it would be held until the
34:41police could arrive. The meeting in the
34:43hotel bar in Canal Park, the one in the
34:46photograph that had broken my heart, Ry
34:48had attended, wearing a police wire.
34:50"Then why didn't you tell me?" I asked,
34:53"Why did you let me think?" "Because
34:56they told me not to," he said. Wendell
34:59said that until they knew who forged the
35:01will, everyone in the family had to be
35:03treated as a possible suspect, including
35:06you. And I figured if you thought I was
35:09a crook, you'd act normal around Veil.
35:12You've always thought I was a little bit
35:14of a crook. He tried to smile. It wasn't
35:17hard to sell. I laughed and I cried and
35:21I hit him on the shoulder hard the way I
35:24used to when we were kids. Then I hugged
35:26him so tight. He said I was cracking his
35:29ribs. Why' you ask about the purse? I
35:32said into his shoulder at the funeral.
35:35Because she always said everything
35:37important was in her purse. He said I
35:40didn't know what was in it. I just knew
35:42if anything was going to save us, it had
35:44be in there. Within 48 hours, after his
35:47lawyer heard the recording from under my
35:49kitchen table, Vale asked for a deal. He
35:52gave Detective Asani everything. The
35:55names of the two witnesses on the forged
35:57will, both employees of an Ammonson
36:00subsidiary, the St. Paul print shop
36:02where a copy of a dead man's notary
36:04stamp had been made and three years of
36:07text messages and emails between himself
36:10and Henrik Amonson, including one sent
36:13in July, the day after Henrik visited my
36:16mother's apartment. The old woman won't
36:18sign. Draft the other version. We'll
36:21need it if she dies before she spends
36:24anything. At her age, it won't be long.
36:27When Detective Asani read me that
36:29message, I asked the question I'd been
36:31afraid to ask since the first day. Had
36:34they done something to my mother? He had
36:36already asked the medical examiner to
36:38review her death. It was her heart, Joe,
36:41he said. Nobody touched her. But Henrik
36:43Amonson was sitting in her kitchen
36:46planning for her to die. I want him to
36:48answer for that. Henrik Amonson was
36:52arrested on a Thursday in December.
36:54Wendell asked me if I wanted to be
36:56there. I said yes. That Thursday was the
37:00dedication ceremony for the brand new
37:02Ammonson Heart Pavilion at Lake View
37:04Regional Hospital. A cardiac wing Henrik
37:07had paid for with a donation of $12
37:09million. There were television cameras.
37:12There was a string quartet. There was a
37:14long red ribbon stretched across the
37:17glass doors of the lobby and a pair of
37:19giant silver scissors on a velvet
37:21pillow. I stood at the back of the crowd
37:24in my good navy blazer with Gus on one
37:26side of me and Ray on the other. Henrik
37:29Amonson stepped up to the podium and on
37:32the little finger of his right hand. He
37:34wore a heavy gold signate ring with the
37:37letter A, his father's ring. Conrad Vale
37:40had worn a copy. Wendell later told me
37:43Henrik had given them to his closest
37:45people like a little club. Henrik spoke
37:47for six minutes about his father's
37:49vision, about his father's belief that
37:52no family should lose someone they love
37:54to a heart that failed without warning.
37:57He spoke beautifully. People dabbed
37:59their eyes, and not one word of his
38:01speech mentioned a woman with a mop who
38:04had given his father her dead husband's
38:06money in an envelope. He picked up the
38:08giant silver scissors. "And Detective
38:11Sergeant Wendel Lasani stepped out of
38:13the crowd with two officers behind him
38:16and a folded piece of paper in his
38:18hand." "Henrik Ammonson," he said loudly
38:20enough for every television microphone
38:22to hear. "You're under arrest for
38:24forgery, conspiracy to commit, theft by
38:27swindle, and financial exploitation of a
38:30vulnerable adult." The string quartet
38:33stopped in the middle of a note. Henrik
38:36stood holding those enormous silver
38:38scissors, his mouth slightly open. And
38:41then over the heads of the crowd, his
38:43eyes found me. Maybe it was my chin. Gus
38:47always said I had my mother's chin. I
38:49didn't look away. I didn't say anything.
38:52I just stood there and let him see me.
38:54Dolly Mercer's girl, the daughter of the
38:57cleaning woman who wouldn't know what to
38:59do with that kind of money. You would
39:01think that was the end. I did for about
39:03three weeks. But men like Henrik Amonson
39:07don't believe they've lost until a judge
39:09tells them so. They just buy more
39:11lawyers. On the 1st of January, Henrik's
39:14attorneys filed a civil action in St.
39:17Louis County District Court. His lead
39:19lawyer was a woman named Victoria Ashkam
39:23from a corporate firm in Minneapolis,
39:25sharp as a paper cut. The lawsuit said
39:28that the 1981 stock certificate was
39:31invalid. It said Felix Amonson had never
39:34had the authority to issue shares
39:36without a vote of the board. It said
39:38that Dolores Mercer, a night janitor
39:41with access to every office in the
39:42building, could easily have taken a
39:45blank sheet of letterhead from Felix's
39:47desk. And it said that even if the
39:49certificate had been real, my mother had
39:52sold her shares back to the company in
39:541999. They attached a copy of a check,
39:57Ammonson Cardiac Systems, payable to
40:00Dolores M. Mercer for $500, dated April
40:051999. On the memo line, it said, "Full
40:08repurchase of all shares." Gus read me
40:12the complaint at his desk above the
40:14hardware store. When he got to the
40:16check, he took off his glasses and
40:18pinched the bridge of his nose. "That's
40:20clever," he said quietly. "That's the
40:22one that worries me. If your mother
40:24cashed that check, a judge could find
40:27she sold the shares for $500.
40:31I went home that night and sat in my
40:33kitchen and couldn't stop thinking about
40:35it. $500.
40:371999, the year my furnace died. The
40:41winter, my mother told me she had $300
40:44to her name. Had she sold them? Had she
40:47taken $500 for her share of everything
40:50without ever knowing what it was worth?
40:52And then I thought of the coffee can.
40:54The coffee can from the top of her
40:56refrigerator labeled emergencies with
40:59$11 and a stack of folded papers I had
41:02been too sad to read. It was in a box in
41:05my basement. I went down the stairs in
41:07my socks, found the box, pried off the
41:09plastic lid, and took out the papers.
41:12And at the very bottom, folded in thirds
41:14to check. Ammonson Cardiac Systems
41:17payable to Dolores M. Mercer, $500.
41:22April 1999.
41:24Never cashed, never endorsed. And across
41:27the front in my mother's blue ballpoint
41:29cursive, she had written three words.
41:32Not for sale. I sat on my basement
41:35stairs and held that check and cried
41:38until my neck hurt. Then I called Gus at
41:4111:00 at night. He answered on the first
41:44ring as if he'd been waiting. When I
41:47read him those three words, he was
41:49silent for a long moment, and then very
41:51softly he said, "Oh, Dolly, you
41:53magnificent woman." The hearing was held
41:56in February before the honorable
41:58Bernardet Raskque, a small, sharpeyed
42:01judge in her 60s, who, Gus told me, had
42:04no patience at all for people who
42:05mistook money for intelligence. "I wore
42:08my navy blazer. I wore my mother's
42:11rosary in my pocket. Victoria Ashkam
42:14went first. She was very, very good. She
42:17painted a picture of an elderly cleaning
42:19woman who had taken advantage of a
42:20grieving young man and who had happily
42:23accepted $500 when the company bought
42:26her out. Several times she said the word
42:29janitor in a way that made it sound like
42:31a crime. I sat very still and let her
42:34talk. My mother had taught me that when
42:36someone is busy showing you who they
42:38are, don't interrupt. Then Gus stood up,
42:42leaning on the cane he didn't need, and
42:44began. He didn't argue either. He just
42:47told the story one piece of evidence at
42:49a time. Exhibit one was the original
42:52certificate on Felix Ammonson's
42:54letterhead, signed and dated in Felix's
42:57handwriting, which a document examiner
42:59confirmed. Exhibit two was Felix's
43:02original shareholder ledger from 1981,
43:04showing the entry for Dolores M. Mercer
43:07in Felix's own hand, 3% recorded the
43:11same day as the certificate. Exhibit
43:14three was the minutes of the company's
43:16very first board meeting in January
43:181982. The board at that time consisted
43:22of exactly two people, Felix Amonson and
43:26his accountant. The minutes approved
43:28unanimously the issuance of 3% of common
43:31stock to Mrs. Demercer, whose assistance
43:34saved this company. And then Gus called
43:37his first witness. Her name was Maret
43:40Soulberg. She was 89 years old and she
43:43had been Ammonson Cardiac Systems first
43:46bookkeeper from 1982 until her
43:49retirement in 2004. She came into the
43:52courtroom in a wheelchair pushed by her
43:55granddaughter. Gus asked her if she
43:57remembered Dolores Mercer. Maret
43:59Soulberg smiled. "Of course I remember
44:02Dolly," she said. Everyone at that
44:04company remembered Dolly. Felix told the
44:07story at every Christmas party for 20
44:10years. The soup lady. He used to say,
44:13"Without Dolly, we'd all be selling
44:15vacuum cleaners." Then Gus asked her
44:18about 1999. Her smile disappeared. She
44:22told the court that in 1999, Felix was
44:26ill for the first time, and his son
44:28Henrik, then in his mid20s, had begun
44:30taking over the company's finances.
44:32Henrik came to her desk one day with a
44:35list of small shareholders and asked her
44:37to prepare $500 checks for each of them
44:40with a letter saying the shares were
44:42worthless and the company was buying
44:44them back as a courtesy. I told him it
44:46wasn't right. Maret said that company
44:49was making money that year. Good money.
44:51He told me to mind my own business.
44:55She looked across the courtroom at
44:56Henrik sitting at the defense table in a
44:59dark suit. So I did, and I've been
45:02ashamed of it for 27 years. The
45:05courtroom was completely silent. Then
45:08Gus lifted the uncashed check out of a
45:11plastic sleeve and handed it to the
45:13clerk. Exhibit 4, not for sale. Judge
45:17Rasque held that check for a long time.
45:20She read the three words in blue ball
45:22point. Then she set it down very gently
45:25on the bench, as if it might break.
45:28There was one more thing. The night
45:30before the hearing, the forensic
45:32accountants that detective Asani had
45:34brought in finally finished tracing the
45:36company's books from 1999 to the sale.
45:39When Henrik had erased my mother's
45:41shares from the records, he had also
45:43erased her dividends. For 26 years,
45:46Ammonson Cardiac Systems had paid
45:48dividends to its shareholders every
45:50year. My mother's 3% should have
45:54received $4.1 million for $1.1 million
46:00paid instead into the account of Henrik
46:02Amonson. P.S. ask about the dividends.
46:06Something isn't right. My mother had
46:08known. Somehow in her last weeks,
46:10sitting in Arn Iverson's office with her
46:13cup of coffee, she had figured it out.
46:15Victoria Ashkam asked for a recess.
46:18Judge Rasque gave her 20 minutes. When
46:21she came back, she stood very straight
46:23and announced that her client was
46:25withdrawing his claim. All of it, the
46:28invalid certificate, the board
46:29authority, the repurchase gone in one
46:32paragraph read in a clipped voice from a
46:36single sheet of paper. Judge Rasque
46:38issued her written ruling anyway a month
46:41later because Gus asked her to. 14
46:44pages. The 1981 certificate was valid.
46:48The 1982 board resolution was valid. The
46:521999 check had never been accepted and
46:55the repurchase had never happened. The
46:58funds at Lakeshore Fidelity Bank
47:00belonged to the estate of Dolores M.
47:02Mercer to be distributed according to
47:05her will of July 11th, which the court
47:07found to be her true and final
47:09testament. The will of June 3rd was
47:12declared a forgery, and Henrik Amonson
47:15was ordered to repay my mother's estate
47:17every dollar of the diverted dividends
47:20for.1 million plus interest and all
47:23legal costs. On the last page, the judge
47:27wrote one sentence that wasn't legal at
47:29all. Gus had it framed for me. The court
47:32notes that Mrs. Mercer was offered $500
47:35for her faith in a stranger and
47:37declined. This court declines as well.
47:41In the criminal case, Henrik Amonson
47:44pleaded guilty in May to forgery, theft
47:46by swindle, and financial exploitation
47:49of a vulnerable adult. He was sentenced
47:51to 7 years in state prison. Conrad Vale
47:55received four. The two employees who
47:58signed as witnesses on the forged will
48:00received probation in exchange for their
48:02testimony. I felt no joy about any of
48:05it. I sat in the courtroom on the day
48:07Henrik was sentenced, and I watched him
48:10take off his father's gold ring and hand
48:12it to his lawyer before the officers led
48:14him away. And all I felt was tired.
48:18Finished. My mother would have called it
48:20done. Done is better than happy. Done
48:24lets you sleep. There was one last thing
48:26I needed to do. In July, I went back to
48:29Lakeshore Fidelity Bank and asked for
48:31Ron Iverson. He took me up to his office
48:34and brought me a cup of coffee without
48:35my asking. I held it in both hands. I
48:39asked him the question I'd been carrying
48:41since November. When my mother came in
48:43that day in June, the day of the
48:45receipt, what was she like? Arin thought
48:48about it for a long time. She was
48:50frightened, he said. That was the day
48:52after Henrik first called her. She asked
48:56me to print her balance on a receipt and
48:58I asked why since she could see it on
49:01the screen. She said because a receipt
49:03is something you can hold on. A screen
49:06is just light. And then while I was
49:08printing it, she took a little sewing
49:11kit out of her purse, needle and black
49:14thread. She sat right there in that
49:16chair and cut open the lining of her
49:18purse with my letter opener and she
49:21sewed that receipt inside. Her hands are
49:23shaking so badly she stuck herself
49:26twice. I asked if I could help her. She
49:29said no. She said my daughter will find
49:31it. She always checks the lining. I
49:34taught her that. I had forgotten. When I
49:37was a little girl, my mother bought all
49:39of our coats and purses secondhand. And
49:42before she let us wear anything, she
49:44made us check the lining. People hide
49:46things in linings, she always said.
49:49Sometimes it's a dollar. Sometimes it's
49:51a love letter. You never know. I found a
49:54$5 bill in a winter coat when I was
49:57seven. She let me keep it. I bought a
50:00coloring book and a whole bag of
50:01butterscotch candies and I gave her half
50:04the candies. I didn't cry in Arie's
50:06office. I made it to the car. Then I sat
50:09in the parking lot on Superior Street
50:12with my mother's purse on my lap and
50:14cried until the meter ran out. Money
50:17doesn't change your life all at once. It
50:20changes it one ordinary thing at a time.
50:23The first thing I did was pay off Lily's
50:25student loans. All 40 $1,000 of them. I
50:30didn't tell her first. I just handed her
50:32the letter from the loan company that
50:33said balance. 0. And she read it
50:37standing in my kitchen in her scrubs and
50:39she sat down right on the floor. Then I
50:42told her the whole story from the purse
50:44to the courtroom. And when I got to the
50:46soup, she laughed and cried at the same
50:48time. exactly the way I had. The second
50:51thing I did was buy a pair of hearing
50:53aids. Not for me. I went to the
50:56aiologist on London Road, the same one
50:58my mother had visited 15 years before,
51:01and I set up a fund. Dolly's ears. Every
51:04night shift worker in St. Louis County
51:06can get hearing aids there for free. The
51:09first person to use it was a 68-year-old
51:12woman named Gloria who cleans the Harbor
51:15Light building. Sixth floor. The third
51:18thing took longer. With Gus's help and
51:21Aries, we built something permanent. The
51:23Thermos Scholarship pays full college
51:26tuition. Every dollar for the children
51:29of night shift workers in Duth. Every
51:32student who receives it gets a letter
51:34explaining where the money came from and
51:36a stainless steel thermos with three
51:39words engraved on the side. Not for
51:41sale. Rey moved back to Duth in the
51:44spring. He lives in the upper half of my
51:47duplex now. Rey works for the
51:49scholarship fund handling the
51:51applications and he is better at it than
51:53anyone I could have hired because he
51:55understands exactly what it feels like
51:56to be offered a way out that isn't
51:58really a way out. Every Sunday he comes
52:01downstairs and we eat spaghetti at my
52:03kitchen table and he asks me how the bus
52:05is because I still drive it. Route 14,
52:0941 stops. Matteo is in the sixth grade
52:13now, and he still tells me a knockk
52:15knockock joke every morning. He has no
52:18idea that his bus driver is a very rich
52:20woman. He knows that I keep butterscotch
52:23candies in a coffee can by the driver's
52:25seat, and that's enough. That's real.
52:28And on Brighton Beach, on the rocky
52:29shore of Lake Superior, just north of
52:32the city, there's a wooden bench now
52:34facing the water. Lily and Ray and I sat
52:37on it on September 2nd on what would
52:40have been my mother's 81st birthday with
52:42a thermos of chicken and wild rice soup
52:45and we told each other the story she
52:47never got to tell us. There's a small
52:49brass plaque on the bench. It says for
52:52Dolly Mercer who believed in a man on
52:54the floor. My mother's purse sits on the
52:57shelf above my kitchen table now with
52:59its broken clasp and its blue rubber
53:01band and its black stitches badly sewn.
53:05Sometimes late at night, I take it down
53:07and hold it on my lap with both hands
53:09resting on top the way she always did.
53:12And I think about the woman who sat on a
53:14recliner on East 4th Street with a pair
53:16of car keys and a torn lining. She was
53:18terrified. She was alone and she was
53:22braver than she knew. My mother didn't
53:24leave me a fortune. She left me a
53:26receipt, a key, and a check for $500.
53:30She refused to cash. The fortune was
53:32just what happened when nobody could buy
53:34her.

About this transcript

This page contains the full transcript of I Found A Bank Receipt In My Late Mother's Purse. The Balance Showed $67 Million by Kate's Fortune Stories, generated from the public captions YouTube serves with the video. The transcript has 8,854 words across 1,239 segments, with the original timestamps preserved so you can click any line to jump to that moment in the embedded player.

What you can do with it

Use the transcript to take notes, quote the speaker, build a study guide, generate a summary with ChatGPT or Claude via the YouTube Summary tool, or export it as a timed subtitle file with YouTube to SRT. You can also re-open it in the transcriber to translate the transcript into 100+ languages.

Free YouTube transcript tool

YouTube2Text is a free YouTube transcript generator — no signup, no daily limit. Paste any YouTube link and get the full transcript instantly, with timestamps, click-to-jump, translation to 100+ languages, AI prompts for ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, and exports to TXT, SRT, VTT, or Markdown.