The 95,000-acre Subdivision Map (Texas)

1. Yes
2. Plat first.

Dave Karoly, post: 367794, member: 94 wrote: 1. Yes
2. Plat first.

In addition to the fact that a line of the width used to indicate a "30 foot road" is shown upon the plat of record along the West line of Block 27, what other reason is there for thinking that a road was laid out there when the subdivision was made?

Is there physical evidence of a road in this area?

I'll grant that last question I asked was a bit of a no-brainer since the lots on the West side of Block 27 do not have any other access to a road if one holds that there is no road delineated on the West side of Block 27 on the subdivision plat.

The question of whether the metes and bounds descriptions came first or the map did is important for just that reason. If one believes that it is reasonable that thousands of individual metes and bounds descriptions were written up before the plat itself was produced, then he or she might also think it reasonable to deduce from the metes and bounds descriptions that no road was actually laid out by the plat if the metes and bounds might be laid out in a way that would squeeze out any room for a road there.

lmbrls, post: 367799, member: 6823 wrote: Is there physical evidence of a road in this area?

There is no road in use there presently. It turned out that the land was unfeasible for agricultural use in the configurations sold. They were mostly sold by the promoter to people in far-flung places like Minnesota and Panama who thought the land an excellent investment. The lots were sold by the purchasers (many for taxes) and consolidated into larger holdings for ranching, which was the land use before the subdivision arrived.

Upon the ground, much of the land is grown up in mesquites and brush. The ages of the mesquites along the West 30 ft. of Block 27 are consistent with trees that grew up after the subdivision was laid out. While some of the 30 ft. roads have been maintained by the County and have gravel pavements, that effort mostly began after 1930. The West line of Block 27 has no remnants of pavement in place.

Here's an example of what the vicinity of part of the West line of Block 27 looks like today. The mesquites on the other side of the fence have grown up in the last thirty years or so. The fence obviously isn't old but most likely replaced a cedar post and wire fence built after 1913. The lots in Block 27 on the far side of the fence have been under common ownership for roughly 50 years (if I recall correctly without cheating and looking at the file).

I can't speak to your situation but courts have taken away isolated undeveloped ranch tracts purchased through tax sales. The undeveloped roads were extinguished.

The tracts were absorbed by the existing ranch owners.

One of the questions that relates to resurveying in the part of Division No. 4 of DR. CHARLES F. SIMMONS' 95,000 ACRE SUBDIVISION is the question of how the subdivision was actually laid out when platted. One point of view has been that the entire subdivision was just done on paper from a survey of the boundary of the Tract. That hypothesis has a number of serious problems that don't fit the facts.

For example, Blocks 12 and 24 all consist of irregular lots bounded on the West by a 30 ft. road that was not laid out parallel to the East line of the tract subdivided forming the East line of Blocks 12 and 24. That is how no surveyor interested in minimizing computational labor (with pencil and paper) would have done that. It would have been much easier to have used that East line of the tract as the base from which to square up the grid of blocks for layout.

The other more reasonable hypothesis that actually does fit the facts is that the roads actually were opened up and the block corners were actually marked on the ground. The standard way of surveying something like that in 1909 would have been to have run the centerlines of the roads, setting posts at the block corners and determining the dimensions of the irregular lots that didn't fit the neat grid of streets.

What best explains the shapes of Blocks 12 and 24 is that the surveyor who laid out the subdivision, Samuel C. Chalk, simply laid out the road along the West sides of Blocks 12 and 24, made a couple of measurements from that road to the fence along the East side of the tract and calculated the lots up in the office as if the fence ran for a couple of miles, straight. You can even tell where Chalk tied to the fence by where even foot distances occur.

MightyMoe, post: 367807, member: 700 wrote: I can't speak to your situation but courts have taken away isolated undeveloped ranch tracts purchased through tax sales. The undeveloped roads were extinguished. The tracts were absorbed by the existing ranch owners.

In this case, the question of whether a road was laid out along the West line of Block 27 is mainly relevant to the purposes of boundary construction. If you claim that there is no road laid out along the West line of Block 27 by the 1909 subdivision plat, then you can shift a number of blocks by at least the 30 ft. width of a road to the West if you believe that all of Division No. 4 was just subdivided on paper and feel at liberty to reconstruct all of the interior lines from the perimeter of the subdivision as you locate it by some means.

Dave Karoly, post: 367794, member: 94 wrote: 1. Yes
2. Plat first.

I agree with both.
I have a hard time imagining how the descriptions were created after a map of some sort. Even some sort of working sketch would be needed.
To me, it is obvious by either creating a stack of description or a map, there was a grand plan of some sort.
Land Locked properties do get created, but that is another topic.

Peter Ehlert, post: 367812, member: 60 wrote: I agree with both.
I have a hard time imagining how the descriptions were created after a map of some sort. Even some sort of working sketch would be needed.
To me, it is obvious by either creating a stack of description or a map, there was a grand plan of some sort.
Land Locked properties do get created, but that is another topic.

Yes, it is completely against all logic and experience to think that someone would sit down and write up thousands of metes and bounds descriptions without a map in front of them. One demonstration of the fact that the map came first, as one would expect, is in the fact that in Block 28, the position of the road that appears on the West line of the block on the map was shifted 2640 ft. East when the metes and bounds descriptions were written up. The sketch below shows the space for the road as actually left by the metes and bounds descriptions of the lots as recorded. Some of the dimensions of Lots 6381 and 6380 that would have been calculated for the arrangement shown on the map were retained without being corrected, however. In other words, the revision was made poorly enough that parts of the original scheme were mistakenly retained.

Is the west boundary of Block 27 the outer-most boundary of the overall subdivision? Was the intent for the 30' roads to have them centered on the bold lines?

Were these "roads" granted/dedicated to the general public as right-of-way or easements for the use of the owners of the lots within the subdivision?

The steel tee-post and wire fence that appears in the photo does in fact appear to have been rebuilt along the line of an older cedar post and wire fence and more or less perpetuates the position of that fence. One surveyor considered the line of the fence to represent the West line of Block 27 as it was originally laid out. Under his theory, the old cedar post and wire fence formerly in place was along the boundary of the tract subdivided as Division No. 4 of SIMMONS' SUBDIVISON.

However, the actual situation is that only the southern segment of the West line of the 30 ft. road along the West line of Block 27 was an existing boundary at the time of the subdivision. The segment in question was not a boundary of any sort. The subdivider owned the land on both sides of the steel tee-post and wire fence, selling off the remainder not laid out into lots four years later and describing the remainder tract from a contemporaneous survey from which one would conclude that there was no fence in place along the the line at the time.

A simple examination of the deed records would have been sufficient to realize that the subdivider did not plat the full extent of the land he owned into lots and sold the unplatted remainders later. In other words, at best, the line of the post and wire fence that appears in the photo perpetuates the line of an older fence built after 1913 that may have perpetuated one of the lines of the 30 ft. road along the West line of Block 27. According to the 1913 survey and the deed executed by the executor of the subdivider's estate, the West line of the 30 ft. road in SIMMONS' SUBDIVISON along the West line of Block 27 was found in a position that the older fence followed fairly closely.

Cameron Watson PLS, post: 367817, member: 11407 wrote: Is the west boundary of Block 27 the outer-most boundary of the overall subdivision? Was the intent for the 30' roads to have them centered on the bold lines?

Were these "roads" granted/dedicated to the general public as right-of-way or easements for the use of the owners of the lots within the subdivision?

The West line of Block 27 is the East line of the 30 ft. road delineated on the plat. Where delineated, the roads were not parts of the lots, and my opinion is that a 30 ft. road is definitely delineated on the plat along the West line of Block 27. The thirty foot roads were generally not dedicated to the public by the subdivision plat but were reserved by the subdivider as strips of land in his ownership subject to a road easement. Some became public roads later when the county began to improve and maintain the roads.

BTW, here is a short account of the life and business activities of Dr. Charles F. Simmons, one of the great marketing geniuses of the 20th century in both the fields of patent medicine and land sales.

https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fsiyz

I noticed the name Pointevent on the plat. The Pointevent family here historically have been major land owners in this area and still are to this day. Currently, they are at the center of a major fracking controversy and battle that is happening on some of their land. They are winning the battle at this point.
The family has consisted of many politicians, judges, bankers, timber barons, developers, Rex kings etc though the years.

Robert Hill, post: 367853, member: 378 wrote: I noticed the name Pointevent on the plat.

Well, that J. Poitevent Survey was made by virtue of land scrip issued by the State of Texas to one J. Poitevent in October, 1873, his payment for clearing the channel of the Trinity River of obstacles to navigation as provided by an act of the Texas Legislature passed that same year.

Upon receipt of the certificate, Mr. Poitevent promptly sold for $140 cash the certificate issued to him, thereby entitling the new holder to 640 acres of the public domain for the sum of $145. That someone else had the land certificate located in the brush country south of San Antonio where the land still is. J. Poitevent most likely never saw it or even knew of it.