Wacky Wednesday: Wills That Make You Go “Hmmm…” – Sandra West

NB: This post is part of a series highlighting wills that contain some interesting, and sometimes bizarre, bequests and stipulations. You can see all these posts here.

It has been said that Americans have love affairs with cars, but but one person took that love to an extreme.

Sandra Illene West was a Texas oil heiress and Beverly Hills socialite who died in 1977.

In her holographic will, she directed that her late husband’s brother, Sol West, bury her dressed in a “lacy nightgown” reclined in the front seat of her 1964 powder-blue Ferrari.

As an incentive for him to carry out her wishes, she specified that he would receive $2 million dollars if he did what she asked, but only $10,000 if he didn’t.

So she was placed in the front seat of her Ferrari at a comfortable slant, and the car was encased in a box measuring 6 by 8 by 15 feet.

The box was then hauled on a flatbed truck to the grave site in the Alamo Masonic Cemetery in San Antonio Texas, and was placed in a nine foot deep hole. To protect it from vandals, a concrete mixing truck poured cement over and around the box.