[jrgm13]

I'm a 64 year old who was a few weeks from being the bastard child of jack and leota. Jack was the only son and would inherrit 160 acres of rich Iowa farmland homesteaded by my great grandfather. And my mother got him to marry her... this messed up jacks life... he avoided ww2 because he was the only child. He abused me physically and mentally and I left home after graduating high school at 17 and going into the navy. I was always the scapegoat for this disfunctinal family, I have ptsd from the beatings and no memory untell my mother was "busted" in the small town grocery store when she jerked my arm out of my socket in the grocery store. My first memory other then my younger brother on fire at my age of 3 weeks past my 5th birthday, was my grandmother on leotas side wanting the truth out of my mother about all the broken bones and such that I'd received my grandmother saw to it that I was kept out of that home for a number of years, being passed around from family to family. They had one room country schools in Iowa then. I was sent back sometime before the 7th grade, when they shut these one room schools down. I remmber the beatings and the things told to me probably past the age of about 10. I came back and lived in an abandoned farm house after being hit head-on by a '64 dodge coupe while riding on a motorcycle in July of 1972 up in Minnesota, I had just gotten out of the navy a few months earlier.. this left me with chronic pain and this ptsd (the va says that I have DID also). Pot helped me with the pain and what I now know is ptsd. I went to school for 2 years and worked as a tool and die machinist for 11 years. I forgave the old man... he was tricked by my mother. I lived on that farm again while going to school and graduated at 32. They had the last kid, a boy, who dropped out of school in the 8th grade and was convicted of burglary and armed robbery while I was going to school on borrowed money (that I paid back).I later learned that he molested my niece during this time
My mother borrowed money to keep him from prison, bought him a new car and paid for him to go to the same technical college that I attended and received an associate of applied science degree in mechanical technology from. My brother got a welding certificate. But the same old scapegoat thing came up and my mother decided that it was my "wild past" that caused him to do these crimes. I've never been convicted of anything other then pot charges. Prison finished my neck and back off and I was never able to work again. When I got out... this was in the late 90s, last century. My mother lost that whole farm over my youngest sibling, but there was still 16 acres of homestead left with a nice house and buildings and trees. She inherited $122.000 after the bankruptcy fron her brother, and put this all into a pig operation and a beautiful machine shop with all the machines that I worked with as a tool and die machinist and then some. My mom and dad worked raising hogs from sows to market ready hogs for 24 years while my brother worked as a welder. My brother worked many hours as a welder and his only connection to the hog operation was cashing checks for the hogs raised by his parents.
One day long ago after I was on disability, my mother came to our old home and asked me to sign my share of what was left to my brother, saying that she could quit working at the nursing home and how my brother and his 400 pound wife were going to raise hogs and he had a machine shop that puts many to shame. My brother and that wife were going to raise hogs and have a manufacturing company on that homestead. He was to take care of her, paying her electric bills, etc... I only knew about my inheritance for 15 minutes... and I believed her and signed this paper. Now she's 89 and still working at the nursing home and buying her own food and paying her own bills. My brothers wife never worked an hour there.
Now, here's my question... that paper that I signed wasn't notarized. My brotherinlaw is a multi-millionare farmer and he just told me to go to the courthouse and get all the records from there over this ownership of that 16 acres with that big house and all of this hog raising set-up (now in mothballs). My brother never learned how to raise hogs and he lives in a nice house in town... waiting for my mother to die so that he can sell it or sell the house in town and move out there.
Our roof is falling in and I've done more work there then anyone over the years. I signed my share away on a lie, trying to help my mother, even after all the evil things that she's done to me. But was this legal, since it wasn't notarized?

Thanks for any input

[ScottGem]

Notarization just means the signature was witnessed by a professional witness. It has no bearing on the legality of the document unless there is a requirement that it was notarized.

If you want to challenge the document you need to consult an attorney.

As to all the rest of your post it is really immaterial to your question.