2 The plaintiffs owned the mineral interest and rights in a certain one-half section and a one-quarter section of land (total 480 acres). The mineral interests in these lands, in respective separate tracts, were leased to Sohio Petroleum Company, Stanolind Oil and Gas Company, and Peppers Refining Company. The said lands became productive of oil and gas, and adjoining lands also became productive of oil and gas. The whole area of proven productivity (several thousand acres) thereafter became designated as the West Edmond Hunton Lime Field, and was ordered unitized by the Corporation Commission, and to be operated and produced as a single unit, by the unit organization, in accordance with a plan of unitization submitted by the lessees of the various tracts in the field. Under the order of the Corporation Commission, and the "unitization statutes" then existing, 52 O.S.Supp. 1949 ? 286.1, et seq., the West Edmond Hunton Lime Unit, a body politic and corporate, was created as such unit organization. A committee, composed of the oil and gas lessees of the various separate tracts comprising the unitized area, and acting for the body corporate, selected Sohio Petroleum Company to operate and develop and produce the unitized area for the unit. This deprived the various lessees of any further right or authority or duty to operate their respective leased premises, or to produce oil therefrom.
