O'donnell v. Snowden & Mcsweeny Co.

• Decision Date: 28 October 1925
• Docket Number: No. 16807.,16807.
• Citation: 149 N.E. 253,318 Ill. 374
• Court: Illinois Supreme Court
• Parties: O'DONNELL et al. v. SNOWDEN & McSWEENY CO.

318 Ill. 374

149 N.E. 253

O'DONNELL et al.

v.SNOWDEN & McSWEENY CO.

No. 16807.

Supreme Court of Illinois.

Oct. 28, 1925.

Suit by Charles B. O'Donnell and others against the Snowden & McSweeny Company for an injunction and for an accounting. From the judgment affirming a decree for defendant, James M. O'Donnell and others appeal on a certificate granted by Appellate Court of the Fourth District.

Affirmed.

Appeal from Appellate Court, Fourth District, on Appeal from Circuit Court, Lawrence County; Charles H. Miller, Judge.

Shaw & Huffman, of Lawrenceville, and Kramer, Kramer & Campbell, of East St. Louis, for appellants.

Gee & Gee, of Lawrenceville, A. M. Gee, of Casper, Wyo., and Paul Speer, of New York City, for appellee.

THOMPSON, J.

A certificate having been granted by the Appellate Court for the Fourth District allowing an appeal from its judgment in this case affirming a decree of the circuit court of Lawrence county, there is presented for our consideration the record and the errors assigned thereon. The decree affirmed denied the relief asked and dismissed for want of equity a bill filed by appellants, the lessors in an oil and gas lease, against appellee, the lessee in the same lease, charging that appellee is by a steaming process skimming the gasoline from the oil produced on the lands of appellants, thereby depriving appellants of royalty due them. There was a prayer for an accounting and for an injunction against the further operation of the steaming plant.

The evidence is somewhat voluminous and on the points vital to a decision of the case is directly contradictory. It can subserve no useful purpose to reproduce the evidence here in detail. We have read it all and shall state only our conclusions drawn from it.

The principal testimony on behalf of appellants is that of four chemists. They testify that they have been employed in the southern Illinois oil field for many years and that they are familiar with the kind of oil produced on the O'Donnell farm; that this oil is about 22 per cent. gasoline, which is the most valuable part of the oil; that the higher the gravity of oil the more gasoline properties it contains and the greater its value; that the gravity of the crude oil produced on the O'Donnell farm is about 32; that the gravity of the oil in the shipping tanks after it has passed through the steaming plant is about 29; that by the process of steaming used by appellee on the O'Donnell farm from 8 per cent. to 11 per cent. of the volume of the crude oil is removed and from 36 per cent. to 46 per cent. of the gasoline properties of the oil is removed; that in warm weather, if the oil produced on this farm were allowed to stand in the storage tanks for a week, the water and other foreign substances would settle and could be drawn from the bottom of the tank by a siphon or otherwise; that in cold weather it will settle, if heated to summer heat, and that it will never be necessary to heat it above 150 degrees Fahrenheit; that, if the oil is heated by turning steam into the water at the bottom of the tank, gasoline evaporation will commence at 187 degrees, and that, if the oil is heated by running the steam through the bottom of the tank in pipes and discharging it outside the tank, it can be heated to 200 degrees before the gasoline is discharged; that heating the oil by injecting live steam into the water at the bottom of the tank emulsifies the water and oil, and is of no assistance in settling the water and foreign substances; that the equipment used by appellee is not adapted for settling purposes, but is a skimming plant for taking the gasoline from the oil. Appellants also produced some witnesses who were producing oil in the southern Illinois field, who testified that the water settled out of their oil without the application of heat to the storage tanks except in very cold weather, when the heat applied did not exceed 120 degrees Fahrenheit. None of appellants' witnesses had ever been employed on the O'Donnell lease. The testimony of the chemists is based largely upon an experiment made by testing in the laboratory a small sample taken from the receiving tank, which contains the oil as it comes from the wells on the O'Donnell farm, and another small sample taken from the shipping tank, which receives the oil from the steaming tank after it is ready to be turned into the pipe lines for transportation to the oil refiners.

Appellee produced 17 witnesses, all of whom were or had been actively engaged in producing oil on the O'Donnell lease, some of them for more than 10 years. The testimony of these witnesses shows that the oil produced on the O'Donnell farm is from Buchanan sand; that it is a heavy oil, and that it is necessary to heat it to cause the water and other foreign substances to settle so that the oil can be delivered into the pipe line for transportation to the refiners; that a series of experiments were conducted by appellee on this lease to determine whether the water would settle without heating, and with heating at various temperatures, ranging from 120 degrees to 200 degrees Fahrenheit; that these experiments showed that merchantable oil could not be produced on this lease until it was heated to about 185 degrees Fahrenheit; that the oil produced has been steamed throughout the life of the lease, from 1907 down to date; that it was discovered in 1913 that the steaming...