Hobart v. Towle
| Decision Date | 27 February 1915 |
| Citation | 107 N.E. 954,220 Mass. 293 |
| Parties | HOBART v. TOWLE. |
| Court | United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court |
Jos Cavanagh, of Boston, for appellant.
Geo. E Curry and Clarence L. Newton, both of Boston, for appellee.
The lands owned by the parties are part of a large tract of unimproved seashore property formerly owned by the Nantasket Company, which laid it out into building lots with streets or ways shown by a plan duly recorded. By the plan Manomet avenue 50 feet in width and one of the principal ways apparently did not extend beyond the southerly line of Lewis street which it intersected, leaving between this line and A street, the boundary on the south, a parcel of undesignated land of approximately three-quarters of an acre. The company very shortly after conveyed the property to trustees who deeded by their numbers certain lots which included the lots now owned by the respondent to one Norwell, bounding them westerly by the easterly line of Manomet avenue extended southerly '409.90' feet, a distance sufficient to carry the avenue to A street. The deed also contained the further provision that the grantors reserved the right to change, lay out anew or discontinue any street shown on the plan not necessary for convenient ingress and egress from the granted premises. But as the respondent's lots had no other means of access shown by the plan the grantors and their privies in estate by this description were estopped from claiming that for a width of 50 feet, and for its entire length the vacant space had not been appropriated as a part of Manomet avenue as finally completed. Cole v. Hadley, 162 Mass. 579, 39 N.E. 279.
The respondent derives title by deed from Norwell. The lots conveyed as we have said were only a part of his purchase, and after designating them by the numbers appearing on the plan they are bounded westerly by Manomet avenue as extended. It thus appears that the fee in the extension of the avenue which they have since conveyed to the town of Hull remained in the grantors. McKenzie v. Gleason, 184 Mass. 452, 458, 459, 69 N.E. 1076, 100 Am. St. Rep. 566. And it is to be inferred from the agreed facts that since the parties bought, the avenue for its entire length has become a public way. The respondent therefore is forced to contend that only the remaining portion comprising a little more than one-half of the area which the trustees afterwards conveyed to the petitioner, who asks to have her title registered free from such incumbrance, must be left open and unimproved for the benefit of her estate.
It is manifest from the record that this parcel has always been eligible for building lots, and the circumstance that the plan contains no subdivision is not as matter of law decisive. Donnelly v. Butler, ...
To continue reading
Request your trial