Title: Hunt v. Portland Baseball Club
Citation: 207 Or. 337, 296 P.2d 495
Docket Number: N/A
State: Oregon
Issuer: Oregon Supreme Court
Date: April 25, 1956

Affirmed April 25, 1956.
*338 Ernest J. Burrows, Portland, argued the cause for appellant. With him on the brief was George H. Layman, Newberg.
David Fain, Portland, argued the cause for respondent. On the brief were Black, Kendall &amp; Fain and John J. Higgins, Portland.
Before WARNER, Chief Justice, and ROSSMAN, LUSK, BRAND and PERRY, Justices.
AFFIRMED.
ROSSMAN, J.
This is an appeal by the plaintiff from a judgment which the circuit court entered in favor of the defendant after it had sustained a motion made by the latter for the award of judgment to it notwithstanding the verdict of the jury in favor of the plaintiff. The amount of the verdict was $2,450. The judgment notwithstanding the verdict recited:
The plaintiff's cause was based upon a charge that August 8, 1952, while the plaintiff, his wife and some friends, Mr. and Mrs. Harvey Park, were leaving the defendant's baseball park where they had been paid *339 patrons, the plaintiff was struck by a foul ball. The complaint, in charging negligence, alleged:
The group of four left the game near the close of the ninth inning and were still in the grandstand when the mishap occurred. The seats which they had occupied were in the non-screened part of the stadium.
The plaintiff-appellant presents a single assignment of error. It reads:
The following brief review of the evidence adopts the version most favorable to the plaintiff.
August 8, 1952, the plaintiff, his wife and the other couple that we have mentioned visited as paid patrons the defendant's Vaughn Street baseball park. The defendant maintains a baseball team in the Pacific Coast League, and on August 8 it was playing a league game. The plaintiff and the other members of his party had seats opposite third base that were unprotected by screening. All four were aware of the fact that the section in which they were seated was not screened and realized that they would have to be on the lookout for foul balls. In fact, the plaintiff testified that when his party took their seats one of them remarked "We'll have to watch out for foul balls, sitting here." The stadium had a seating capacity of 10,000. The part to the rear of home plate was protected by a screen 199 feet long. That part had *340 2,500 seats. The evidence indicates that some baseball patrons like to view the game from seats back of home plate, but that area of a stadium is exposed to greater danger from flying balls than the other parts and the spectators seated there have less opportunity to avoid the dangers than those who are located in other sections of the structure. The record suggests that since the patrons back of home plate are subjected to dangers of wild pitches and foul balls which they cannot readily avoid, ball parks frequently erect screens for their protection. Other visitors at the park, so the record indicates, prefer to watch the game without the interference of an intervening screen.
The plaintiff had been in the defendant's baseball park often and was intimately familiar with baseball. He termed himself a fan and went to the games as frequently as opportunity offered. Although his home is in Portland, his fondness for the game had caused him to attend games in Seattle, San Diego and San Francisco. He testified, "I have sat in the bleachers lots of times." He freely conceded that he knew that one of the incidents and dangers of the game is the entry of foul balls into the bleachers. We quote from his testimony:
We have mentioned the fact that when the plaintiff was struck he had left his seat and was walking along a passageway which led to a nearby exit. He had reached a place where he was confronted with one or two steps that he had to ascend on his way to the exit. Many other people were leaving about the time that he and his party were departing and the passageway was well filled with patrons slowly moving toward the exit. All were interested in the closing moments of the game and had their eyes upon the batter as they slowly shuffled along the crowded passageway. The plaintiff described the situation in this way:
His wife added:
*342 Mr. Park, who was immediately to the rear of the plaintiff, testified:
The two women were ahead of the plaintiff and had already ascended the step or two which we have mentioned when the plaintiff reached that spot. At that moment he turned from the batter, looked at the step and was struck by the foul ball.
When the plaintiff was struck he was 96 feet from the batter, whose name was Hank Art. He conceded that if he had watched the batter he would have seen the ball and would have had sufficient time to have dodged. His exact words were:
*343 The defendant's ball park has a broader screen than most of the other parks which are occupied by teams in the Pacific Coast League and, according to uncontradicted testimony of the manager of defendant's baseball park, the other clubs in the Pacific Coast League "have exits similar to ours." If any club anywhere employs screened exits and passageways, the record does not disclose the fact.
The above constitutes a sufficient resume of the evidence.
We shall now consider the plaintiff-appellant's contention that the evidence above reviewed shows that the defendant was negligent. Curtis v. Portland Baseball Club, 130 Or 93, 279 P 277, had its situs in the same stadium as the case at bar. The plaintiff in that case was seated behind the screen which we have mentioned, but at that time the screen was only 150 feet long. He claimed that a foul-tipped ball somehow curved around the end of the screen and struck him. The circuit court entered judgment in his favor. In reversing the judgment and ordering a nonsuit, this court spoke as follows:
The facts recounted in the preceding paragraphs show that the defendant provided protective screening for patrons who were seated in the part of the grandstand which afforded them inadequate opportunity to avoid foul balls. The plaintiff's seat enabled him to watch the batter and was sufficiently distant from the home plate so that he could readily avoid foul balls. Likewise, when he left his seat and headed for the exit he was able to see the batter, and he acknowledged that he had adequate opportunity to evade foul balls. The holding of the Curtis decision indicates that the defendant was not negligent.
Adair Adm'x v. Valley Flying Service, 196 Or 479, 250 P2d 104, was an action by the administratrix of one Darius C. Adair, who lost his life when an airplane, of which the defendant was lessor and of which one Redding was lessee and operator, crashed. The action was predicated upon a charge that when Redding applied to the defendant for the airplane he (Redding) was intoxicated and the defendant was aware of that fact. In denying liability, the decision ruled that Adair was guilty, as a matter of law, of contributory negligence. It said:
1, 2. We believe that the same observation is warranted in the case at bar. If the defendant should have provided screening for the plaintiff's protection, the plaintiff was fully aware of the lack of the protection, and yet stayed in the ball park. If the defendant was remiss in any duty concerning screening, the plaintiff "must be presumed to have acquiesced" in the existing situation as he was fully apprised of its nature, but, in our opinion, the record discloses no negligence upon the defendant's part.
The answer averred assumption of risk. The plaintiff-appellant's brief states:
We quote the following from Restatement of the Law, Torts, § 893:
Comment, Illustration (1), follows:
In its practical manner, 65 CJS, Negligence, p 848, § 174, gives us this statement of the doctrine:
*348 Prosser, Law of Torts, 2d ed, p 303, says:
We turn now to page 307:
The first decision of this court which mentioned the doctrine of assumption of risk is Dubiver v City Railway Co., 44 Or 227, 74 P 915, 75 P 693. The plaintiff in that case, a 15-year-old boy, who appeared by his guardian, was injured when one of the defendant's streetcars collided with a delivery wagon that he was driving upon a public street of Portland. The boy was in the employ of his father, but was not employed by the defendant and had no contractual relationship with it. It is difficult to perceive how the case could *349 have called for a declaration about assumption of risk since no such defense was pleaded and there was no assignment of error upon the subject. The decision said:
The quoted statement possibly was not well phrased, and we believe that it has been misunderstood. We think that the author of the decision intended his words to mean that in the master and servant relationship the doctrine is applicable, but that it can be invoked only by the master, and not by a stranger to the relationship. Gentzkow v. Portland Railway Co., 54 Or 114, 102 P 614, is the next instance in which this court mentioned the doctrine of assumption of risk. Neither a relationship of employer and employee nor one of any other contractual nature existed between the parties to that action. The court said:
It will be observed that the court perceived that the doctrine is applicable in the two-fold categories of (a) master and servant and (b) contractual relationships. The court almost envisaged the rule as later *350 phrased by the American Law Institute's Restatement.
Furbeck v. I. Gevurtz &amp; Son, 72 Or 12, 143 P 654, 143 P 922, is another case in which no contractual relationship, master and servant or otherwise, existed between the parties. The plaintiff was injured while walking upon a downtown public street of Portland. A temporary canopy, which a contractor had erected over the sidewalk, collapsed and fell upon the plaintiff. We now quote from the decision:
The decision correctly stated the doctrine, but its declaration that "such a plea can be invoked only in *351 cases between master and servant" was erroneous. Dubiver v. City Railway Co., which the decision cited, did not warrant the statement; in fact, the case called for no statement whatever concerning the doctrine.
In Eldred v. United Amusement Co., 137 Or 452, 2 P2d 1114, the relationship between the plaintiff and the defendant was akin to that of the parties in the case now at bar. In that case, the plaintiff, who was a paying guest in the defendant's amusement park, was injured while riding upon a rotating, power-driven device known as the "Merry Mix Up." After he had purchased a ticket and had taken the seat in the Merry Mix Up selected for him by the attendant, the latter fastened a safety chain around the plaintiff so as to preclude the possibility that the swiftly rotating device would hurl him from the seat. When the Merry Mix Up achieved high speed the safety chain gave way and the plaintiff was thrown to the ground, 18 feet below. The decision said:
Normally, the doctrine of assumption of risk does not extend to hidden hazards and to others of which the individual who becomes injured had no knowledge. We quote again from the decision:
It will be observed that although the decision declared that assumption of risk is not a defense in cases of that kind, the facts called for no statement of that nature. It is evident that the plaintiff had not assumed the risks which caused his injury. Dubiver v. City Railway Co., supra, and Furbeck v. Gevurtz, supra, did not sustain the court's statement.
From Whisler v. United States National Bank of Portland, supra, we take the following:
The plaintiff in that case was actually an employee of the defendant, but at the time of her injury was off duty. Therefore, she was deemed an invitee. The decision did not limit the application of the doctrine to the master-servant relationship.
The foregoing are our precedents. The thought that the defense of assumption of risk can be invoked only *353 in master and servant cases can be traced back clearly to Dubiver v. City Railway Co., supra. But that decision when carefully read does not support the conception of the holding. It holds that although the doctrine is applicable in master and servant cases, one who is not the servant's master cannot avail himself of the defense. Any other interpretation of the decision would do no credit to Mr. Justice WOLVERTON, an able jurist, who was the writer of that decision. The Gentzkow decision, far from supporting the plaintiff's position, warrants the application of the principle in this case. The same can be said of the Furbeck opinion, with the exception of its unfortunate interpretation of the Dubiver decision. The Eldred case reached the right result, but failed to perceive that one does not assume risks of which he cannot have knowledge. Adair Adm'x v. Valley Flying Service, supra, in declaring "Darius C. Adair must be presumed to have acquiesced in such negligent operation", came close to embracing the doctrine of assumed risk. Its failure to have done so was due to the condition of the pleadings. Burch v. Peterson, 207 Or 232, 295 P2d 868, decided April 11, 1956, which held that a social guest takes the premises as he finds them, with the exception of concealed entrapments, lends support to the view that one who voluntarily exposes himself to known and appreciated dangers may not recover for injuries sustained thereby. ORS 30.110 and 30.120, which prevent a nonpaying guest from recovering damages from his host in automobile and airplane accidents unless the guest can prove evil intention, gross negligence or intoxication, denote a social policy that one who voluntarily exposes himself to a known danger should be held to have assumed the risks thereof.
3, 4. It is clear from the plaintiff's own testimony that he was intimately familiar with the game of baseball *354 and the risks inherent in being a spectator at a game. He knew and appreciated the circumstances when he took his place in the unscreened part of the stadium. A conclusion is warranted that his appreciation and his knowledge of risks were chargeable to him as long as he remained in the park. In the language of the Restatement, plaintiff was in the position of one "who knows that another * * * is doing a dangerous act * * *, and who nevertheless chooses to enter upon or to remain within the area of risk." We agree that such a person
The language just quoted appeals to us as well considered and as constituting a useful statement of the controlling principle in the light of legal and social policy. The Oregon statements of the rule were made in cases that did not call for the application of assumption of risk. We surmise that before the statements were made, adequate and accurate consideration was not given to that principle of law. So far as those statements are contrary to what is expressed herein they are overruled.
We are brought to the conclusion that plaintiff by his own act of knowingly placing himself in an area of appreciated risk, which was not created by any unreasonable conduct of the defendant, bars him from recovery for his injuries.
It is seen from the foregoing that the challenged judgment can be sustained upon two grounds: (a) the *355 record discloses no negligence, and (b) the plaintiff-appellant had assumed the risk of injury. Although we have full confidence in the first ground, we prefer the second.
The assignment of error discloses no merit. The judgment of the circuit court is affirmed.