Home/Supreme Court of Oklahoma/Van Meter v. H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Co.

Van Meter v. H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Co.

1935 OK 188, 41 P.2d 904, 170 Okla. 604, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 778
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedFebruary 26, 1935
Docket24990
StatusPublished
Cited by30 cases

This text of 1935 OK 188 (Van Meter v. H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas 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
Van Meter v. H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Co., 1935 OK 188, 41 P.2d 904, 170 Okla. 604, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 778 (Okla. 1935).

Opinion

McNEILL, C. J.

This action involves an application for a permit to locate, drill, and operate a second oil and gas well on an unplatted tract of land comprising 5.5 acres located within the U-7 oil and gas drilling zone of Oklahoma City.

Pursuant to chapter 178, Session Laws of Oklahoma, 192,3 (secs. 6170-6179. O. S. 1931), the governing body of said city enacted a comprehensive zoning ordinance, designed for the betterment, safety, health, and general welfare of its people. This zoning ordinance divided the city into several zoning districts, and by subsequent amendment, the U-7 oil and gas district was established.

Among other things, said ordinance provides that no oil and gas well shall be drilled within the corporate limits of said city except within the limits of said U-7 district, and also provides for the issuance of a permit by the superintendent of buildings. In the event that any party may be affected by the order of the superintendent of buildings, the right to appeal is granted to the board of adjustment, and from that board to the district court, where the matter is tried de novo. An appeal may be taken from the judgment of 'the district court to the Supreme Court of Oklahoma.

It appears that the defendant in error A. J. Diffie, Inc., heretofore was granted a permit to drill an oil and gas well on the unplatted tract of land in question, comprising 5.5 acres, known as the Terminal Oil Mill tract, at the point or location requested by said defendant in error. This permit was granted by the board of adjustment on May 18, 1931, and an appeal was thereafter lodged in the district court and judgment rendered by said court, on January 21, 1932, sustaining the granting of said permit.

While said matter was pending on appeal before the district court, said A. J. Diffie, Inc., in conjunction with the I-I. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Company proceeded to drill and complete said well on July 18, 1931. The Denver Producing- & Refining Company, one of the plaintiffs in error, completed drilling two wells, King No. 1 and King No. 2, on June 19, 1931, and on September 16, 1931, respectively, on its tract of unplatted land containing 10.8 acres which adjoined - the tract of land in question on the north. The Slick-Curtis well to the east and north of the Terminal Oil Mill tract was brought in as a producer on August 19, 1931. This well was located on a tract of 4.11 acres. The Slick Company and associates also brought in two wells, known as Terminal Oil Mill Co. No. 4 and Terminal Oil Mill No. 5, to the south and west of the tract *606 on which the Diffie well was drilled. These Terminal wells were located on two tracts of unplatted land, each of which contained not less than five acres. The Ander’sonKerr, Inc., brought in a well to the south and west of the tract of the Terminal Oil Mill Company on an unplatted tract of land comprising 3.7 acres. About the time the Diffie well was completed, the H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Company and A. J. Diffie, Ine., defendants in error, filed their joint application for permission to drill a second well ■on said Terminal Oil Mill tract, being the permit involved herein, contending as grounds for said application that there were two offset oil and gas producing wells to said tract, one to the north and the other to the south thereof, both of which wells were draining the oil and gas therefrom. The Terminal Oil Mill Company, the ojwner in fee of the tract in question, joined in this application.

The building superintendent denied the joint application. The matter was appealed to the board of adjustment, and on September 26, 1932, after a hearing, the board of adjustment refused to grant said permit, finding as follows:

“The board further finds that the drilling of more than one well upon the block herein described would be inequitable and would not be within the intent and purpose of the ordinances of said city and would be contrary to the public interests, and would also work an unnecessary hardship upon adjacent property owners and upon the property owners within said block described herein, for the reason that one well upon said block will completely and adequately drain the oil and/or gas from under the same in an equitable manner. * * *
“7. That the tract of land upon which applicants ask to drill a second well for oil and/or gas purposes does not contain a fractional part, in addition to its 5 acres, of an area of not less than 2% acres, but contains in all only 5.5 acres, and under the terms of said ordinances, but one well can be drilled upon said tract of land above described.
“8. That from the nature of the area in which said first well of applicants is located, anfi the drilling ‘blocks’ heretofore created and granted by the board of adjustment on adjacent tracts of land to other persons, firms, and corporations, the granting of a permit to applicants to drill a second well upon said five-acre tract would result in unjust financial loss, unnecessary hardship on others, and would be in violation of the letter and the spirit of the ordinance and unjust and inequitable toward surrounding property owners.
“9. That there should be no special exception to the terms of the city ordinances granted in favor of said application, as no facts have been shown that would justify same. Therefore said application should he, and hereby is denied.”

An appeal was lodged from this order and judgment before the district court of Oklahoma county. On February 23, 1933, the district court of said county found in favor of the plaintiffs, H. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Company and A. J. Diffie, Inc., and found that a permit should be granted to them to drill this second well as prayed for in their application, and decreed in part as follows:

“It is therefore considered, ordered, adjudged and decreed that the judgment and order of the adjustment board Be and the same is hereby reversed and the plaintiff, I-I. F. Wilcox Oil & Gas Company, a corporation, its successors and assigns, are hereby granted a permit to drill an oil and gas well at the location set forth in the application on file herein and the provisions of the ordinance in respect thereto are varied to that extent and an exception is made to the ordinance to that extent in order that substantial justice may be done and the variance and exception will not be against the public interest, said well to be located at the point and place specified in plaintiffs’ application, the same being the second well to be drilled upon the property upon which the plaintiff holds a leasehold estate, and said property to be embraced within this permit for the drilling of said well is situated in Oklahoma county, state of Oklahoma.”

The oil companies, Denver Producing & Refining Company, the Southwestern Cotton Oil Company, Anderson-Kerr, Harrison M. Smith, and also J. W. Van Meter, superintendent of buildings of the Oklahoma City, plaintiffs in error, protested to the granting of said permit to drill said second well.

A copy of a map attached to the brief of the Denver Producing & Refining Company is set forth.

*607

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Bluebook (online)
1935 OK 188, 41 P.2d 904, 170 Okla. 604, 1935 Okla. LEXIS 778, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/van-meter-v-h-f-wilcox-oil-gas-co-okla-1935.