Conrad v. West-end Hotel & Land Co

• Decision Date: 05 June 1900
• Citation: 36 S.E. 282,126 N.C. 776
• Court: North Carolina Supreme Court
• Parties: CONRAD et al. v. WEST-END HOTEL & LAND CO. et al.

126 N.C. 776

36 S.E. 282

CONRAD et al.

v.WEST-END HOTEL & LAND CO. et al.

Supreme Court of North Carolina.

June 5, 1900.

DEDICATION—MAPS—COURT—EXPENSES— NECESSITY.

1. Where an improvement company opening up land for city lots laid out an open space of land surrounded by streets, which it called "Grace Court, " and filed a map with the register of deeds of the county, showing the land as laid out, and sold lots fronting on the court to complainants by deeds which referred to the map, such acts constituted an irrevocable dedication of the streets and court, and the company and its grantees could not build on the court for private purposes, or narrow or close the streets surrounding it, though the lots were bought under another map, in which the court was reserved, and made subject to future disposition.

2. That the public authorities of the city or county had not formally accepted the dedication of the court was immaterial, since, plaintiffs having been induced to buy under the map, the continuation of the streets and court formed a part of the consideration for the purchase of the lots.

Douglas, J., dissenting.

Appeal from superior court, Forsyth county; Shaw, Judge.

Action by S. F. Conrad and others against the West-End Hotel & Land Company and others to enjoin the erection of buildings on a court. From a judgment in favor of plaintiffs, defendants appeal. Affirmed.

Watson, Buxton & Watson, for appellants.

Jones & Patterson and Glenn & Manly, for appellees.

MONTGOMERY, J. In the year 1890 the defendant the West-End Hotel & Land Company was the owner and in possession of a tract of land situated and lying on the western and northern boundaries of the city of Winston. The defendant company, with the view of opening up the tract of land as suburbs of the city, laid off the same into lots to be sold for homes, public buildings, and squares, with streets and avenues. Immediately at the western end of Fourth street of the city there was an open space of land, pear-shaped, which the company called "Grace Court." The company extended Fourth street along the southern edge of Grace court, and turned it towards the north along the western edge of Grace court, and then, by an avenue along the northern edge of the court, to Fourth street. On the western side of the street, lying on the western edge of Grace court, was a piece of land on which the company was to build the Zinzendorf Hotel. A map, with the outlines which we have described, was made by a competent engineer in the employment of defendant company, and by its direction registered in the office of the register of deeds of Forsyth county, in Book 35, p. 136. Afterwards the plaintiffs each purchased from the defendant company one of the lots so laid off, lying along the southern edge of Fourth street as it ran along Grace court. In the deeds which were executed by defendant company to the plaintiff purchasers, reference was made to the plat which had been filed in the register's office, which plat, as we have seen, contained the square called "Grace Court, " and the streets surrounding and adjoining. Several of the lots have been built upon as homes. Since the execution of the deeds to the plaintiffs, the defendant company has sold and conveyed by deed a part of Grace court to the defendant W. B. Taylor, and is endeavoring to sell other parts of the court The plaintiffs claim that the registration of the plat of the land of defendant company, and the reference made in its deed to the plaintiffs to that plat, is a dedication of Grace cou...