United States Bond & Mortgage Co. v. Reddick
| Decision Date | 06 November 1939 |
| Docket Number | 4-5635 |
| Parties | THE UNITED STATES BOND & MORTGAGE COMPANY v. REDDICK |
| Court | Arkansas Supreme Court |
Appeal from Union Chancery Court, Second Division; W. A. Speer Chancellor; reversed.
Judgment reversed, and cause remanded.
Marsh & Marsh, for appellant.
Joe K. Mahony, H. S. Yocum, Emon A. Mahony and Charles E. Wright, for appellee.
On November 21, 1912, J. Franklin Reddick, hereinafter referred to as Frank Reddick, a resident of Texas at that time, and still is, purchased a forty-acre tract of land in Union county, Arkansas, for a home for his mother, and for the appellees, his brother and wife, to live thereon and take care of their mother. The mother and appellees moved on said land in 1913, and continued to live there until after the mother's death in 1923. Frank Reddick paid the purchase price for and received a deed to said land in his name from C. G. Dumas and wife, the then owners of said land.
In 1931, Frank Reddick, being insolvent, filed a voluntary petition in bankruptcy in the United States District Court at Dallas, Texas, and in Schedule B, a statement of all property of the bankrupt, he listed the forty acres of land in controversy among his assets at a valuation of $ 600 and swore that he was the owner thereof. Thereafter, at a sale of the bankrupt's assets, appellant became the purchaser of this forty-acre tract. The sale was approved and a deed issued to it by the trustee.
On April 5, 1935, appellant brought an action in ejectment against appellees to recover the possession of said land, alleging ownership thereof and deraigning its title as above stated. Appellees answered, denying appellant's ownership, and asserting title in themselves. They pleaded adverse possession for more than seven years and that their possession had been open, notorious, peaceable, and without any adverse claims, and they, therefore, pleaded the seven years' statute of limitations and adverse possession in bar of the action. On a trial, appellees based their claim in addition on the ground of an oral contract with Frank Reddick to convey said land to them in consideration of their moving on the place and taking care of the mother during her lifetime.
Trial resulted in a decree in appellees' favor from which is this appeal.
We think the court erred in so holding. The undisputed facts, in addition to those above stated, are that the record title to this land has at all times since its purchase been in Frank Reddick, with the exception that in 1920 he conveyed same to A. V. Warner and the latter, on the same date executed a deed back to Frank Reddick, but which latter deed was not recorded until some time later. The land was assessed in the name of Frank Reddick and the taxes paid in his name from the year 1915 to the year 1930. In 1922, before his mother's death, this land became valuable because of the discovery of oil and gas in its vicinity, and in that year Frank Reddick executed and delivered an oil and gas lease on said land to the Humble Oil & Refining Company for a consideration of $ 3,400, paid in cash, which was more than eleven times the $ 300 purchase price paid by him to Dumas. All of this was well known to appellee. The lease just mentioned retained a one-eighth royalty interest in the oil and gas produced therefrom in Frank Reddick. It was a five-year lease renewable annually by payment of a consideration which was payable to Frank Reddick. After the expiration of this lease another lease was executed between the same parties for a consideration of $ 40, but appellee, Harvey Reddick, says that this $ 40 was paid to him by his brother. Like reservations of royalty were provided in this lease in favor of Frank Reddick, as also annual payments to renew the lease from year to year for a period of five years. Appellees made no objection to his brother's having exercised these acts of ownership over said land, although he says it...
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