167 Iowa 154 | Iowa | 1914
In July or August, 1910, the plaintiff built a cement sidewalk on two sides of his property. The walk was constructed of cement and sand blocks four feet square. This walk was built by the plaintiff on his own motion. After the walk was built, and about the 3d day of August, the city council of Wyoming, Iowa, passed an ordinance requiring a walk to be laid at the place where plaintiff had previously laid his walk and at a different grade from that on which plaintiff had built. Before, however, attempting the construction of the new walk, the plaintiff wa? notified to take up and change the walk as laid down by him. This he failed to do. Afterwards the town entered into a contract with one Grind-rod to put in the new walk, and in this contract with Grindrod it was provided that the material and blocks, heretofore used by the plaintiff in the construction of the walk, should be taken up, and, so far as suitable, used in the building of the new walk. Grindrod undertook the building of this new walk, and in doing so removed all the blocks placed in the walk previously built by the plaintiff, and found none of them suitable to be relaid. After the blocks were removed they were piled up along the street, and were left there for some time, and while the new walk was being put in. Thereafter Grindrod, assuming to be the owner of these blocks, sold them to defendant, and this action is brought to recover the value of the blocks so claimed to have been converted.
We think the court erred in directing a verdict for the defendant, and the case is therefore' — Reversed.