## Facts

- In 1898, private grantors conveyed a strip of land in Hubbard County, Minnesota, to a railway company for “right of way and for railway purposes,” with language providing the conveyance would last only “so long as” the land was used for those purposes and would terminate if the railway was removed or the land used otherwise.
- The railroad’s interest later was held by Burlington Northern Railroad Company, which discontinued rail operations and removed tracks and ties in the 1980s.
- In 1991, Burlington Northern conveyed its interest in the corridor to the State of Minnesota’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR), which incorporated it into the Paul Bunyan State Trail.
- Adjacent landowners (Hess and the Sandbergs) acquired abutting parcels and, beginning in 1998, blocked portions of the trail crossing their properties.
- The DNR filed a quiet title and declaratory judgment action; the district court granted summary judgment to the DNR, the court of appeals reversed, and the Minnesota Supreme Court granted review.

## Issues

1. Whether the 1898 deed conveyed a fee simple determinable or only an easement for railroad purposes.
2. If the deed conveyed a fee simple determinable, whether Minnesota’s Marketable Title Act extinguished the grantors’ possibility of reverter for failure to record notice within the statutory period.
3. If the deed conveyed only an easement, whether the railroad abandoned the easement when it ceased operations and removed the tracks.

## Decision

- The court held the 1898 deed conveyed a fee simple determinable, not an easement.
- The court held the Marketable Title Act extinguished the possibility of reverter because no statutorily effective notice preserving the interest was recorded within the Act’s period.
- The court reversed the court of appeals and reinstated summary judgment for the DNR, quieting title to the corridor in fee simple absolute in the DNR.
- Because the interest was a determinable fee and the possibility of reverter was extinguished, abandonment analysis was not dispositive.

## Legal Principles

- Deed interpretation turns on the instrument’s text and structure; language granting a “strip of land,” coupled with durational language such as “so long as,” can create a fee simple determinable rather than an easement.
- Inclusion of deed features consistent with a fee transfer (e.g., release of dower rights) may support construing the conveyance as a fee estate.
- When the same instrument uses distinct language to create an easement in a separate clause, that contrast can support construing the primary corridor conveyance as a fee rather than an easement.
- Minnesota’s Marketable Title Act can extinguish ancient future interests, including a possibility of reverter, unless preserved by timely, statutorily compliant recording; extinguishment leaves the record title holder with fee simple absolute.

## Conclusion

The Minnesota Supreme Court concluded that the railroad received a fee simple determinable under the 1898 deed and that any possibility of reverter was later extinguished by the Marketable Title Act, so the DNR held fee simple absolute title to the former rail corridor used for the state trail.


State ex rel. Dep’t of Nat. Res. v. Hess, 684 N.W.2d 414 (Minn. 2004)