Your estate plan should be the most important set of legal documents you create and execute over the course of your lifetime. It should help protect you and your assets throughout your lifetime as well as determine how those assets will continue to provide for loved ones after you are gone. At the Ellicott City, Maryland law firm of Sinclair Prosser Gasior. We understand the importance of your estate plan as well as your choice of attorney to assist you in the creation of your plan.
Ellicott City, Maryland
Ellicott City is an unincorporated community and the county seat of Howard County, Maryland. With a population of 65,834 as of the 2010 census, Ellicott City is the largest unincorporated county seat in the country.
In 1766, James Hood used the “Maryland Mill Act of 1669” to condemn 20 acres for a mill site adjacent to his river-side 157-acre property. The site was later known as “Ellicott’s Upper Mills.” Benjamin Hood then sold the mill to Joseph Ellicott in 1774 for 1,700 pounds. Shortly thereafter, Joseph Ellicott and his brothers founded “Ellicott’s Mills”, which became one of the largest milling and manufacturing towns in the East. The town retained the name “Ellicott’s Mills” when the U.S. Postal stop opened on October 7, 1797.
In 1830, Ellicott’s Mills became the first terminus of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad outside Baltimore, the first commercially operated cargo and passenger railroad in the country. It bears the designation as the “Oldest surviving railroad station in America”. In 1829, New York industrialist and Baltimore foundry-owner Peter Cooper began testing his iron steam engine, Tom Thumb (1791-1883), on the B&O Railway. This was the first time a steam locomotive was used to transport persons over rails in the United States. The famous race between Tom Thumb and a horse-drawn rail carriage took place between Relay Junction on the return trip from Ellicott’s Mills towards Baltimore in August 1830.
In 1867, a city incorporation charter was secured for Ellicott’s Mills forming a local government with a mayor and council, and the name was changed to “Ellicott City”. The first mayor was E.A. Talbot, who lived in a stone house and operated a lumber yard at the base of the river. His business was washed away in the flood of 1866, and again in 1868. He was offered a clear title on his home from his opponent Issacs if he threw his reelection, which he did. The only chartered city in the county, Ellicott City lost its charter in 1935 with a proposal from Senator Joseph Donovan, as the tax base from saloon fees lost in Prohibition caused citizen protest when taxes were shifted to residents.
Since 2005, Ellicott City has been ranked four times among the top “20 Best Places to Live in the United States” by Money and CNNMoney.com. and in 2009, Ellicott City appeared on Newsmax magazine’s list of the “Top 25 Most Uniquely American Cities and Towns.”
Sinclair Prosser Gasior in the Ellicott City Community
The attorneys and staff at Sinclair Prosser Gasior are proud to be active members of the Ellicott City community and to call the residents of Ellicott City our friends and family. We firmly believe that our ties to the community and the people of Ellicott City allow us an advantage when helping clients with their estate planning needs. Given the importance of your estate plan, we understand that choosing the right attorney to assist you is imperative and we would be honored to be that choice.
Creating your estate plan will be one of the most important endeavors of your lifetime. Once your estate plan is in place, it should do must more than simply dictate what happens to your assets when you are gone. While creating a plan for the distribution of your assets is part of a comprehensive estate plan, a well thought out plan should also help protect and grow those assets while you are here as well as ensure that they are available to provide for loved ones in the event of your incapacity or death. Furthermore, as you move through the various stages of your life, your estate plan should be reviewed and revised to mark those stages and the additional estate planning goals you likely acquire as well. For example, when you marry or become a parent for the first time, you should take the time to update your estate plan to include your spouse and/or child. You may also wish to incorporate new components into your plan, such as incapacity planning and probate avoidance. Hopefully, the value of your estate will grow along with your family, prompting the need to include asset protection strategies into your plan as well. Once you have a well-established family and career, you should begin to focus more on the future by creating a retirement planning component within your estate plan. As you get closer to actually retiring you will also want to discuss the need for Medicaid planning and funeral planning with your estate planning attorney. The highly personal nature of estate planning means that there may be additional, less common, goals and objectives that need to be included in your plan such as special needs planning or business succession planning.
At the Ellicott City, Maryland estate planning firm of Sinclair Prosser Gasior we know it can be difficult to discuss deeply personal, and often sensitive, estate planning issues with a stranger, It is for this reason that we strive to create lifelong relationships with our clients that allow us to help protect you, your assets, and your loved ones both now and in the future.
Contact Us
If you have additional questions or would like to get started on your estate plan, contact the experienced Ellicott City, Maryland estate planning attorneys at Sinclair Prosser Gasior by calling (410) 573-4818 to schedule an appointment.
