(MONEY Magazine) – Q. Our 24-year-old retarded daughter recently moved into an apartment with another disabled woman. Both receive Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Medicaid. How can we leave her some of our estate (we have another child) without curbing her benefits? My wife and I are in our forties. Jonathan D. Stone Andover, Mass. A. I'm sure that you and your wife will live at least 35 more years and probably double your estate, but you're right to be concerned. SSI is a federal program that pays as much as $434 a month to people who are aged, blind or disabled. The catch is that recipients may have no more than $2,000 in assets ($3,000 for a couple), plus a home and one car. And SSI may be reduced by: 1) outside earnings of more than $65 a month, 2) $20 or more of investment income monthly or 3) gifts of food, clothing or shelter. Joseph L. Matthews, a San Francisco lawyer and author of Social Security, Medicare and Pensions (Nolo, $15.95), points out that you could buy your daughter a house to relieve her of rent payments, since homes do not count as SSI resources. The gift would reduce her income by $164.66 for the month in which you give it, though. And if you pay her real estate taxes too, each of those payments would diminish that month's income by as much as $164.66. As for your estate, Harley Gordon, a Boston lawyer and author of How to Protect Life Savings from Catastrophic Illness and Nursing Homes (Financial Planning Institute, $19.95), suggests that you establish a discretionary trust. This would allow the trustee to cover education, travel, entertainment, telephone calls and medical bills not paid by Medicaid. You should set up the trust now with $1, and revise your wills to fund it from your estate after you both die.

Q. Please fill me in on some financial history. Who was Mr. Ponzi, and what was his scheme? Who was Mr. Keogh, and how did he develop his plan? And who was Mr. Clifford, and whom did he trust? Bob Askey Longmont, Colo. A. Charles Ponzi, an Italian immigrant, was hailed as Boston's "Wizard of Finance" after World War I, when he paid investors a return of 50% for investing their cash with him for 45 days, and 100% for 90 days. He claimed he had discovered that postal-reply coupons bought in foreign countries could be redeemed in the U.S. for as much as five times their original value; he said he had agents all over Europe buying them up. People went wild and sent in some $15 million before learning that Ponzi had simply been paying old investors with the money he collected from new ones -- thus forever lending his name to such pyramid schemes. Eugene Keogh, a New York City congressman from 1936 to 1966, has a more worthwhile legacy. In 1957 he introduced legislation that enabled the self- employed to enjoy the same tax-deferred retirement savings that employees get. My favorite, however, is the late George Clifford II -- and not just because I attended high school in Minneapolis with his grandchildren. Of course, I had no idea then that they were the Clifford trust Cliffords, the family renowned for founding the Cream of Wheat company at the turn of the century. According to George III, the whole trust business started when his dad wanted to avoid F.D.R.'s higher tax bite during the Depression. He transferred some stock into a trust for his wife Virginia, hoping the dividends would be taxed at her lower rate. The Internal Revenue Service took umbrage, and the dispute wound up in the U.S. Supreme Court, which declared the trust invalid in 1940. A year later, Congress legitimized the Clifford trust -- and it remained a favored tax shelter until Congress undid its advantages during the 1986 tax reform.

Q. I inherited 16 stock certificates from Telefonos de Mexico that the company gave my mother when she acquired telephone service in Mexico in the early 1970s. Now that the company has gone private, are the certificates worth anything? Chris Baylor Arvada, Colo. A. !Caramba! I was thrilled to get your letter because Telmex stock has been burning up the market like a bowlful of salsa in a gringo's tummy. In 1987, shares were worth 9 cents each; currently, they fetch about $2.35 apiece traded over the counter in bundles of 20 as American Depositary Receipts. That's a 2,511% increase. Unfortunately, however, your shares won't bring a windfall. Teresa Currielche, the company's investment relations manager in Mexico City, thinks you have a mix of bonds and stocks. The bonds were issued with face values of about 100 to 300 pesos -- only that was back when the peso was worth eight U.S. cents; today it's down to an infinitesimal 1/3,140 of a dollar. (Don't confuse it with the recently issued nuevo peso, which is equivalent to 1,000 of the old ones.) So your bonds may not be worth the postage it would cost to redeem them. The stocks are worth more, but probably less than $100 all together, depending on whether your mother redeemed the coupons that may have come with them. To find out how much, send picture- perfect copies to Sra. Currielche at Telmex (Parque Via 198-508 Colonia Cuauhtemoc, Mexico, D.F. 06599; telephone: 011-525-703-3990). But don't expect a reply manana. The company is deluged with such requests.

Q. My grandmother had a collection of three-inch-high porcelain figurines stamped made in Occupied Japan on the bottom. How can I learn whether they are valuable? Merri Rudd Albuquerque A. Thanks to a decree by Gen. Douglas MacArthur, all items exported from Japan during the 1945 to 1952 occupation had to be stamped made in Occupied Japan. Lately, these OJ items, as they're called, have become popular with U.S. collectors. Florence Archambault, author of a coffee-table book titled Occupied Japan for Collectors (Schiffer Publishing, $49.95), says prices have doubled in the past 15 to 20 years. But your figurines, I'm sad to say, might fetch only $8 to $10 each because they are so small (see the price list in her book). There's a club for OJ collectors, and its newsletter, the Upside-Down World of an OJ Collector (called that because you have to turn things upside down to find the mark), would run a classified ad for about $3. To advertise, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to: OJ Club, 29 Freeborn St., Newport, R.I. 02840.

Q. I borrowed $20,000 to get through dental school and have since repaid about $20,000 to the Student Loan Marketing Association (Sallie Mae). Now the agency claims I owe $23,000 more. What gives? I guess this is testimony to the old adage that physicians and dentists make terrible businessmen. David W. Naterman, D.D.S. Gainesville, Ga. A. Well, shut my mouth! At first I thought Sallie Mae, the quasi-governmental agency that buys and administers student loans, was giving you a thorough drilling. It appears, though, that you have been bitten by the interest rates -- some as high as 16.5% -- that prevailed when you took out your variable- rate loans back in the early 1980s. Thanks to those rates, you still owe $22,745. But look on the bright side: All you have to do now is fill about 300 cavities to -- ah -- polish this off.