Spreckels Sugar Co. v. Indus. Accident Comm'n

This is an application to review an award of the Industrial Accident Commission. There is no conflict in the evidence, the ultimate facts are found by the commission, and the question, presented is one as to whether upon those facts the award of the commission can be sustained in respect to the amount which it allowed the dependents of one who was admittedly an employee and had been killed by accident in the course of his employment.

It appears that the deceased employee left no dependents except his brother and his brother’s family, consisting of his wife and two minor children. The brother was paralyzed and incapacitated and for several years he and his family were supported wholly by the decedent, whose average monthly contribution for that purpose was $145. During these years, however, the brother’s wife was training herself as a teacher at a normal school and the state university, and some three months before the accident to the decedent secured a position as a teacher, and from then on was herself in receipt of a salary. Her earnings went to the support of her family; it became but partially instead of wholly dependent upon the decedent, and the latter’s contribution to its…