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Per the book, "Lest We Forget", Vol 2, pgs 524-526;submitted by Edith Steeples Whisman, 1980:

Francis O Steeples:
Francis Oliphant (Frank) Steeples was born in Musselborough, Scotland, March 4, 1843. He grew to manhood, went to school and attended Oxford University for some time. While there he saved a schoolmate from drowning, and was awarded a medal for bravery, which had the head of a stag on it. He later had the stag's head made into a pin for his wife-to-be. This pin is still in the family.
The family were of the Protestant persuasion, and were members of the Christian Church.
He was a stonemason by trade, and came to America to work in 1871. He returned to Scotland, and married Mary Ann Morrison, April 5, 1872, in Edinburgh, sailing for America again that same evening. Mary Ann, born October 20, 1847, in Edinburgh, Scotland was the daughter of Andrew and Helen (Doig) Morrison.
Arriving back in America, they came west to settle in Chicago, where he had previously worked, arriving shortly before the great fire, after which he built the new post office building and also the government building.
David James was born there January 27, 1873, and on December 27, 1875 Helen Isabelle was born. She lived only two years, passing away on December 3, 1877.
The family then moved to Des Moines, Iowa, where he, being a stonemason, found work helping build the present state capitol building in Des Moines. He did much of the decorative stone work there. On March 31, 1878, Francis Oliphant, Jr. (Frankie) was born. In the winter time when work on the capitol was slack on account of cold and stormy weather, F.O. worked as end man with a minstrel show, much to the disgust of his wife.
Working with the stone so much, he took what the doctors then called "stone cutters consumption". He was advised to come to Kansas for his health, arriving in Rooks County in the spring of 1879, after coming to Fort Hays by train, purchasing a team and wagon there, and hauling all their worldly goods to the place he took as a homestead. They built a sod house on the southeast corner of the SE 1/4 of Section 25 in Northampton Township, Rooks County, Kansas.
Never having lived on a farm, he knew nothing about farming, so had to learn the best way he could, by trial and error, and from his neighbors. Farming became too much for him and in the early spring of 1881 he took pneumonia, and died April 29, 1881, leaving his wife and two little ones. Burial was in the Pleasant View Cemetery, Palco, Kansas. Frankie had died September 16, 1879 and that same year, just sixteen days later, Helen Isabelle (Nell) was born, September 27, 1879.
Not being able to keep farming and the household going, Mary Ann married again in 1882 to George Samuel Burns, a widower, who proved up on the claim.
They had three children, George Henry, born September 8, 1883, Mary Ethel, November 15, 1886, and Olive May on March 19, 1889.
Meanwhile David James Steeples had grown to manhood and had bought the south eighty acres of Section 36, the north eighty being, for some reason, called school land.
G.S. Burns acquired the north eighty acres some way, and they built a soddy on it, across the road from the other. They moved there and put up other buildings and lived there for a time. David James then bought the north eighty of Section 36 from G.S. Burns and they moved back to the original house.
David James then married Myrtle Fulcher, daughter of Franklin Douglas Fulcher, November 26, 1898 and they moved in with his mother and stepfather, while he was building a frame house on the north eighty acres of Section 36. Money being scarce and the laborers few, it took some time to get the house built, and their first child, a daughter, was born in the old sod house.
The original homestead land is still in the Steeples family and being farmed by the fourth and fifth generations of the family. David James later bought out his stepfather, and he and Mary Ann retired and moved to Plainville where they lived a good many years. Mary Ann died in June 1929 in Pueblo, Colorado. Burial was in Loveland, Colorado.
D.J. then bought the NW 1/4 of Section 25 which was mostly pasture land, and is now all pasture.

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