Girl Scouts fight for share of $39 million trust

Trial Notebook

By Steven P. Garmisa

Hoey & Farina

Posted April 21, 2021 11:39 AM

With no wife or children, William P. Ingersoll decided to take care of 17 civic organizations that operated in his hometown, Canton, Ill. One of the groups — the “Girl Scouts of Canton” — was slated to receive 5% of the net annual income of the William P. Ingersoll Trust when he died in 1973. That would have purchased a lot of cookies over the years. According to the trust’s 2017 IRS Form 990-PF, it has $39 million in assets and handed out $1.9 million that year. But in 1973 the Girl Scouts didn’t have any troops in Canton …

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