Susquehanna Fertilizer Co. v. Spangler
| Decision Date | 04 January 1898 |
| Citation | 39 A. 270,86 Md. 562 |
| Parties | SUSQUEHANNA FERTILIZER CO. v. SPANGLER et ux. |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Appeal from court of common pleas.
Action by Andrew Spangler and wife against the Susquehanna Fertilizer Company. From a judgment for plaintiffs, defendant appeals. Affirmed.
Argued before MCSHERRY, C.J., and BRYAN, ROBERTS, BOYD, and BRISCOE JJ.
Charles Marshall, E. H. Gans, and B. Howard Haman, for appellant. R R. Boarman and Robert R. Brown, for appellees.
Andrew Spangler and his wife brought an action against the Susquehanna Fertilizer Company to recover damages caused by an alleged nuisance. Judgment having been rendered in their favor, the defendant appealed.
The declaration averred that the plaintiffs were owners of two lots of ground on each of which there was a dwelling house that the plaintiffs and their family lived in one of the dwelling houses, and kept a store in it, and that the other was rented to tenants from time to time; and that the defendant conducted and maintained a factory for the manufacture of fertilizers, phosphates, manures, and compounds; and that from said factory, from time to time there arose noxious, noisome, offensive, and unwholesome vapors, smoke, and foul and disagreeable odors and noxious gases, and were spread and diffused over and upon the lots of the plaintiffs, and upon and into the dwelling houses erected on said lots, and caused great discomfort and annoyance and sickness to the plaintiffs and their family, and destroyed their furniture, bedclothes, and wearing apparel, and greatly corrupted and polluted the air, and rendered it deleterious to the health of the plaintiffs and their family, and took away from them the reasonable and comfortable enjoyment of the houses as places of abode, and greatly impaired and diminished the value of the dwelling houses, and the value of the store as a place of business. The defendant pleaded that it did not commit the wrong alleged. The houses alleged to belong to the plaintiffs and the factory of the defendant are situated in Canton, a large and populous village adjoining the city of Baltimore. The evidence showed that one of the lots was owned by the plaintiffs. This lot is at the corner of First street and Eighth avenue. There is no testimony in the record as to the other lot, which adjoins the first one. The evidence for the plaintiffs tended to prove the other facts averred in the declaration. The evidence for the defendant contradicted them, and also tended to show that, with the exception of a few houses, the entire locality where the nuisance is alleged to exist is given up to fertilizer factories, wharves, elevators, and a railroad, and that the Spangler property is in close proximity to large hog pens and manure pits. The court granted two prayers in behalf of the plaintiffs. The first prayer is restricted to the premises at the corner of First street and Eighth avenue, and it substantially leaves it to the jury to find the truth of the evidence offered on the part of the plaintiffs, and it maintains that upon the finding of these facts the plaintiffs are entitled to recover. It does not, however, state the measure of damages. With the exception of the description of the property affected, it is a literal copy of the first prayer in Malone's Case, 73 Md. 268, 20 A. 900, which this court adjudged to be correct. The second prayer of the plaintiffs maintained, in substance, that, if the nuisance was found by the jury as stated in the first prayer, the recovery would not be defeated, even if the defendant used care and skill, and employed the best and most approved appliances, in the management of its works. The doctrine of this prayer was laid down in Malone's Case. At page 276, 73 Md., and page 900, 20 Atl., the court said: "No principle is better settled than that where a trade or business is carried on in such a manner as to interfere with the reasonable and comfortable enjoyment by another of his property, or which occasions material injury to the property itself, a wrong is done to the neighboring owner, for which an action will lie; and this, too, without regard to the locality where such business is carried on; and this, too, although the business may be a lawful business, and one useful to the public, and although the best and most approved appliances and methods may be used in the conduct and management of the business." The defendant offered three prayers. The court rejected the first prayer, and granted the other two. The rejected prayer is in these words: "The jury are instructed that, before the plaintiffs can recover under the pleadings in this case, they must believe that the fumes and gas from the factory of the defendant have occasioned substantial injury to the house owned by the plaintiffs jointly, and in determining this question the jury are instructed that they should take into consideration the locality and all the surrounding circumstances; and that, when expensive works have been constructed, which are needful and useful to the public, if they so find, that persons must not stand on extreme rights, and bring actions with respect to every trifling annoyance, but must submit to the reasonable consequences of the carrying on of trades in this immediate neighborhood, which are actually necessary to trade and commerce; and in considering the question of damage to the property of the plaintiffs the jury are instructed that the plaintiffs cannot recover for any injury they might have prevented by ordinary effort and care." There was evidence that the gases from the defendant's factory not only injured the physical structure of the plaintiffs' house, but made it extremely uncomfortable, disagreeable, and unwholesome as a place of abode, and also seriously injured the business of the store.
This court has several times had occasion to consider the rights of a party under such circumstances. An action for a nuisance rests on the same principles as those which support every other action of tort. If the defendant has committed an injury to the rights of property of the plaintiffs, he must respond in damages. In Dittman v. Repp, 50 Md. 516 there was an application for an injunction to restrain the defendants from carrying on a brewery on Bond street, in the city of Baltimore. It was alleged that they were using steam machinery, which produced...
To continue reading
Request your trial