Marathon Oil Co. v. Western Oil & Drilling Co.

1938 OK 572, 89 P.2d 939, 185 Okla. 53, 1938 Okla. LEXIS 517
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedNovember 15, 1938
DocketNos. 27445, 26727, Consolidated.
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 1938 OK 572 (Marathon Oil Co. v. Western Oil & Drilling Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Marathon Oil Co. v. Western Oil & Drilling Co., 1938 OK 572, 89 P.2d 939, 185 Okla. 53, 1938 Okla. LEXIS 517 (Okla. 1938).

Opinion

DAVISON, J.

The Western Oil & Drilling Company, a corporation, filed an action in the district court of Oklahoma county against the Marathon Oil Company, a corporation, to quiet the rights and title of plaintiff in and to the northwest quarter of section 6, township 13 north, range 3 west, Indian Meridian, in Oklahoma county, under and by virtue of an oil and gas mining lease executed to plaintiff thereon, and for cancellation of an alleged void oil and gas mining lease executed on said premises to defendant, and for appointment of a receiver.

Upon filing the suit, application was made by plaintiff for a restraining order against the defendant and for temporary and permanent injunction, restraining and enjoining the defendant from interfering with plaintiff in the possession of said leasehold estate. The restraining order was issued and later, upon proper notice and hearing, a receiver was appointed to take charge of and develop the property.

A motion was filed to vacate the order appointing receiver and to discharge receiver. The motion was overruled, and defendant has appealed from that order to this court, in cause herein No. 26727.

The defendant filed a motion to suspend further proceedings in the district court of Oklahoma county on the alleged ground that prior to the filing of said suit an action had been instituted in the District Court of the United States for the Western District of Oklahoma wherein the defendant Marathon Oil Company is plaintiff and Gilbert N. Hathaway, otherwise known as G. N. Hathaway; Orna A. Hathaway as guardian of the person and estate of Gilbert N. Hathaway, an insane and incompetent person; and Orna A. Hathaway, as defendants therein, involving the same subject matter.

Defendant filed its motion to strike portions of .plaintiff’s petition.

Motion to suspend proceedings and the motion to strike were both overruled, and the court entered an order approving a contract between plaintiff and defendant relative to development and operation of the property involved, in lieu of such development and operation by a receiver.

Defendant filed its answer setting forth its rights under the oil and gas lease upon the property named in plaintiff’s petition.

Upon hearing had, the court rendered judgment in favor of the plaintiff, and from which judgment the defendant has appealed. (Case-made No. 27445 in this court.) *55 By stipulation of the parties hereto, this court has ordered that the two causes he consolidated and that they be briefed and considered together.

Hereinafter the parties will be referred to separately as they appeared in the respective courts.

The facts out. of which the dispute over the conflicting oil and gas mining leases arose, involved the question of whether or not the property upon which the leases were executed was or was not a homestead at the time the lease through which defendant Marathon Oil Company claims was executed. A brief statement relative thereto is as follows: Gilbert H. Hathaway became the owner of the northwest quarter of section 6, township 13 north, range 3 west of the Indian Meridian. The land may be also described as lots 3, 4, and 5 and southeast quarter of the northwest quarter of section 6, township 13 north, range 3 west, Oklahoma county, Okla. The deed to Hathaway was dated June 9, 1910.

The land was bought with the combined earnings of Hathaway and his wife, Oma A. Hathaway. The Hathaways lived in Arizona at the time, and in April, 1913, they moved on this land and occupied it as their homestead. They were both telegraph operators, and while living on the farm, Mr. Hathaway worked' some in the telegraph office at Edmond, Okla.

While living on the farm, Hathaway deeded the land to his wife, and the deed was recorded. They lived on the land until the latter part of 1917, when they moved to Gleburne, Tex., and the farm was rented out for one year with privilege of renewal for five years. Hathaway worked at Cle-burne and Gainesville, Tex., as train dispatcher.

On February 27, 1918, a charge of insanity was filed against Mr. Hathaway in the county court of Oklahoma county, and he was tried and found to be insane and was committed to the -hospital at Norman, where he remained several weeks and was discharged. He then moved to Sapulpa and became train dispatcher there, and on February 7, 1919, Hathaway purchased the dwelling he had been renting and lived in same in 'Sapulpa and was chief dispatcher for the Frisco until February 8, 1926, when his wife again filed charges against him and he was tried and found to be insane and again committed to the hospital at Norman. Oma A. Hathaway, his wife, was appointed guardian of his person and property. On June 4, 1926, Hathaway escaped and went into Texas, and later into Utah, and then to Pocatella, Idaho, where he remained until some time in 1930, when he returned to Oklahoma and remained awhile, and then went to New Mexico for awhile, and then to Ft. Worth, Tex., and engaged in the insurance business. In 1935 he returned to Oklahoma.

During this time, Mrs. Hathaway remained in Sapulpa with an adopted daughter.

On October 9, 1926, Hathaway filed application in the county court to be restored to his sanity and released from guardianship. The application was resisted by his wife, and the court found that he was still insane and was not capable of looking after himself and property.

On March 2, 1927, Oma A. Hathaway executed an oil and gas lease on the country property named herein, located in Oklahoma county, to Wright & Sears. The lease was not joined in by the husband, and was executed while he was out of the State of Oklahoma. During the month of December, while Hathaway was in Idaho, he learned that his wife had executed an oil and gas lease on the Oklahoma county property, and, on December 25, 1929, he had prepared and filed in Oklahoma county an affidavit setting up certain facts relative to the Oklahoma county farm being the homestead of the family and that the Sapulpa property was not the homestead.

The defendant, Marathon Oil Company, holds, by assignment from Wright and Sears, a lease on 125 acres of the lease executed by Mrs. Hathaway and executed after Hathaway had been declared insane and before his competency was restored.

On October 11, 1930, Hathaway again made application to be restored to competency, but the request was not allowed. On appeal, the district court of Creek county, on April 8, 1935, issued an order restoring him to all of his rights in competency.

On October 12, 1929, Mrs. Hathaway executed an, affidavit in which she stated in substance that she and her husband established their' residence in Sapulpa during the month of February, 1919, and that they purchased the home in 'Sapulpa where she had resided for about seven years, and that she and her husband mutually agreed •to abandon the country property in Oklahoma county as a homestead, and that she was asserting no claim to any homestead right in Oklahoma county.

*56 On April 9, 1935, Oma A. Hathaway and her husband executed a quitclaim deed to the Oklahoma county farm property to B. V. Johnson, who, joining with his wife, made an oil and gas lease to the plaintiff herein, the Western Oil & Drilling Company.

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Bluebook (online)
1938 OK 572, 89 P.2d 939, 185 Okla. 53, 1938 Okla. LEXIS 517, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/marathon-oil-co-v-western-oil-drilling-co-okla-1938.