Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 48).pdf/749

city of Fargo was incorporated as a municipal corporation on the 12th day of April, 1875, under an act to incorporate the city of Fargo, apporved March 5, 1875; that on or about the month of April, 1913, the defendant adopted the commission form of government pursuant to the provisions of chap. 77, Laws North Dakota 1911; that a copy of the Act of March 4, 1885, being a special law providing for a board of education for the city of Fargo, is made a part of the complaint, and an amendment of that act approved February 2, 1915 (Laws 1915, chap. 125), amending § 14, and repealing § 24 thereof; that in April, 1885, defendant by vote of the people organized its board of education; that the members thereof became elective officers of the defendant, a municipal corporation; that the defendant has since 1885 conducted its public schools pursuant to the provisions of the Act of March. 4, 1885, and the amendment thereto; that among other real estate owned by the defendant is block 3 of Darling's addition the city of Fargo, on which there is a certain public school building designated as "the Aggasiz School"; that at all times during the year 1920, and since, the title and ownership, control and possession of the schoolhouse, the furniture, books, and apparatus and of block 3 and all appurtenances thereof were vested in defendant; that upon the west side of block 3 is a public playground, used and frequented, and permitted to be used and frequented, by more than 500 children, ranging from 6 to 15 years of age; that upon the playground the defendant, through its officers, agents, and servants, the said board of education, wilfully and negligently, and by reason of carelessness and wrongful acts and omission of its said officers, agents, and servants, and for want of due attention to its duties, erected and suffered to be erected, and permitted to remain for several weeks prior to December 1, 1920, upon such school playground, and in a public and notorious manner, two chutes or inclined troughs, the summits of which were 8 or more feet in height, and accessible to children by means of permanent iron ladders from which the chutes or inclined troughs sloped towards the west at a steep grade to the ground; that a few feet in a westerly direction from these chutes the defendant, through its officers, agents, and servants, publicly and notoriously erected, and permitted to remain for several weeks prior to December 1, 1920, several series of heavy swings, the same being contrivances and apparatus adapted for people to swing upon to and fro, and were constructed of wood and were suspended from poles or timbers which were fastened or attached