Yes, I recall him speaking of leaving his record collection to St. John's, too, which makes me more sanguine that there's a will somewhere around. He was a vet of the Coastguard: does that help with funeral expenses, etc?

Let me second Deckman's excellent suggestion about all of us leaving some kind of instructions re the disposition of our stuff. We take it (and, I suppose, life) too much for granted. I've got Jeff Warner's song "Little Black Train A-Coming" running through my head these days:
"... Get all your business right/Better put your things in order/for the train might come tonight..."

Thank you, Devon, for taking the lead with all this. I'd love to help but I'm in Princeton, 6 hrs north.

Jon