Marr v. Bunker

92 Mo. App. 651, 1902 Mo. App. LEXIS 515
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedFebruary 25, 1902
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 92 Mo. App. 651 (Marr v. Bunker) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Marr v. Bunker, 92 Mo. App. 651, 1902 Mo. App. LEXIS 515 (Mo. Ct. App. 1902).

Opinion

BLAND, P. J.

Omitting caption, the petition is as follows:

“Plaintiff, for cause of action, states that she is, and was at the time hereinafter mentioned, the owner of certain premises situated in the county of Howell and State of Missouri, [654]*654■described as follows, to-wit: Lots 1 and 2, in block 10, of Old Mountain Yiew, being the premises on which the plaintiff' then resided.
“Plaintiff further states that at the times hereinafter mentioned, the defendants composed the firm known as Bunker Brothers, doing a lumber business in the said town of Mountain Yiew, Missouri. That the said firm of Bunker Brothers owned and operated a planing mill and also owned and kept considerable lumber stacked on their yards and about their planing mill. That said planing mill plant and lumber yards owned, run and operated by defendants, were situated on a lot in close proximity to the said premises belonging to plaintiff. Plaintiff further states that the said planing mill plant was so defective and improperly built and constructed, and that the lumber stacked on defendants’ yards and their shaving pile were in such close proximity to their machinery and their fires, which were kept burning on the yards of defendants, and that said mill plant and lumber yards were so carelessly, negligently and unskillfully managed by the agents, servants and employees of defendants in charge thereof, that fire broke out on the premises of defendants on the -;- day of -, 1900, creating a conflagration in their mill plant and on their lumber yards; and that through the negligence and carelessness of defendants as aforesaid, the fire escaped from the premises of defendants during said conflagration and set fire to the residence of plaintiff situated on the premises above described, and totally consumed the same, to plaintiff’s damage in the sum of $700. And said fire further consumed and damaged furniture stored in the said residence and belonging to plaintiff, to plaintiff’s damage in the sum of $150. And the said fire further consumed, killed and destroyed fruit trees and shade trees and shrubbery, planted and growing in said plaintiff’s yard, to plaintiff’s damage in the sum of $150. Wherefore plaintiff says she is damaged in the [655]*655total sum of $1,000, for wbieb sbe asks judgment, together with the costs of this suit.”

The following is the answer:

“Now come the defendants in the above-entitled cause, and for answer to plaintiffs petition filed herein admit that at the times mentioned in said petition they composed, the firm of Bunker Brothers. Admit that their lumber yard and mill were destroyed by fire at the time alleged in said petition, but aver that said fire was kindled through no fault, negligence or carelessness of these defendants, their agents or employees, but by accident; and in consequence of high winds then prevailing the fire got beyond the control of these defendants. And deny each and every allegation in plaintiff’s petition contained, except what are herein specifically admitted.
“Defendants, for further defense, say, that any property of plaintiff so destroyed by fire, if it was so destroyed, was destroyed through the neglect, carelessness and fault of said plaintiff, and that by reasonable care and diligence plaintiff might have avoided any damage to her property.”

The issues were submitted to a jury who returned a verdict for plaintiff placing her damages at six hundred and fifty dollars. Timely motions for new trial and in arrest were filed and overruled, whereupon defendant appealed.

H. O. Bunker having died pending the appeal, the cause, as to him, has been dismissed in this court and the action is now against S. J. Bunker alone.

In 1900, the Bunkers owned and operated a planjng mill at Mountain Yiew station, on the Current Eiver railroad, Howell county. The dry kiln and lumber sheds were near the railroad track. At the side of the dry kiln was an inclosed shed into which was blown shavings from the planers in the mill, which shavings were used for the'purpose of heating the furnaces in the dry kiln. When not needed for this purpose, by means of a cutoff, the shavings were carried fifty feet east [656]*656of tbe dry kiln and deposited into a sink in tbe ground from twenty to twenty-four inebes deep, and there burned.

On a Sunday in tbe summer of 1900, and during a protracted dry and beated season, fire started in tbe shaving bouse and consumed the mill plant and a large amount of lumber in tbe yards. A fire brand or spark was blown from tbe nearest stack of lumber, a distance of three hundred and forty feet, onto tbe roof of plaintiff’s residence, where it spread and consumed tbe bouse, some of her household goods and destroyed fruit trees growing in tbe yard and her yard fences.

Tbe machinery was not in operation on tbe day of tbe fire and there was no fire in tbe engine bouse. Shavings bad been burned in tbe pit tbe day previous and about nine o’clock on tbe morning of tbe fire some fire was discovered in tbe pit. There was a considerable wind blowing from tbe conflagration in tbe direction of plaintiff’s residence and other houses in her immediate neighborhood.

On tbe part of tbe plaintiff there is slight evidence that there was fire in the pit at the time tbe shavings bouse took fire and some evidence that there was fire there after tbe conflagration was over. The theory of tbe plaintiff’s case is that there was fire in the pit, which was fifty feet away from tbe shavings bouse, and that this fire was carried by tbe wind to the shavings bouse.

Tbe evidence further is that plaintiff bad no water on her premises; that if she had had water it would have been an easy matter to have saved her building.

On the part of the defendants the evidence tends to prove that defendants kept a watchman on their premises both day and night; that at six o’clock in the morning tbe day watchman went on duty and that about nine o’clock he went to the shavings- pit and stirred up the slumbering shavings and then thoroughly saturated the pit and the ground around it'with water and he is very positive in his evidence that he put out all the fire. That at about eleven o’clock, and just after n [657]*657train bad passed, fire was discovered on the roof of tbe shavings bouse; that the superintendent went up and with a bucket or two of water put the fire out; that it did not burn through the roof and he is positive that he put out the fire. At noon the superintendent, who had been at work inside of the plant, and the watchman, went to dinner. While they were at dinner fire broke out in the shavings house. The people in the immediate vicinity, the employees of the defendants, and one of the defendants, who was present, made every possible effort to extinguish the fire but on account of the high wind and the intense heat they were unable to do so. That the defendants kept barrels of water near its dry kiln and shavings house; that there was plenty of water in the millpond and that they kept Babcock fire extinguishers, all of which were used to extinguish the fire but were wholly unavailing.

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Related

Crumley v. Western Tie & Timber Co.
129 S.W. 46 (Missouri Court of Appeals, 1910)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
92 Mo. App. 651, 1902 Mo. App. LEXIS 515, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/marr-v-bunker-moctapp-1902.