My father was Vestal S. Cook, who was born NOvember 3, 1849, at Shawnee Mission,
  Kansas; died March 1918. He married Calra Belle Stevenson, January 20, 1891. There
  were six children. His mother died when he was seven years old. He lived with his
  grandparents during the Civil War in Lees Summit, Missouri. His brother, John, was
  fighting in the Civil War. Vestal ran away from home at 15, joining a wagon train
  going West; he got as far as Great Bend.
     As a young man, he helped to put up stone fences in Auburn, Kansas. Later in
  1872 he went to the Choctaw Indian territory, taking horses. He did logging for a
  saw mill near Atoka, I.T. Later he purchased the Lehigh I.T. saw mill.
     My father and mother were living in the Indian Territory at the time of the
  opening for settlement. Father made the first run, from Guthrie to Oklahoma City,
  April 1889. The largest run was the Cherokee Strip in 1893. His brother, John, was
  able to stake a claim three miles west of Capron, Oklahoma.
     Father had a growing business with three lumber yards and a saw mill in Coal
  County, Oklahoma. The first yard ws opened in 1884. These yards were established
  as the V.S. Cook Lumber Co.
     Because of my mother's health - malaria - we moved to Kansas in 1900 and lived
  on the ranch north of Hardtner. Father's interest in this land was inspired by his 
  older brother, John, who had visited the Medicine Lodge area with the army at the
  signing of the Indian Peace Treaty of 1867, later returning to start ranching in
  the early 1880's. Vestal started acquiring acreages in 1892 through tax sales and
  purchases that finally totalled nearly 5,000 acres. He purchased good registered
  Herefords as the foundation of a cow herd which he constantly worked to improve.
     After a year, we moved to Medicine Lodge, buying a large two-story house east 
  of Elm Creek, where I was born. Father opened and operated a general store in 
  Medicine Lodge, also a small lumber yard, in addition to his ranching interests.
     My father's first car was a white Steamer. The year was about 1910. Sometimes
  when driving, it would get on fire underneath. One time I was in the front seat
  with Mother, I happened to look over the side and saw flames leaping up from below,
  I cried, "Dad, it's on fire again!" All our passengers had the doors open ready to 
  jump out. The fire soon burned out, and we returned home safely.
     The children of V.S. Cook were Vestal Lee, married Frances Axline, one child,
  a son, Vestal, Fr.; Frank Finley, married Laura Stevens, two children, a son Vestal 
  Stevens, and a daughter, Ruth Verhyden; Laura Stevens Cook passed away and Frank
  married Edith Dickensheet, two children, a son Frank Finley, and a daughter, Ann
  Drummond; Royale, died at age two of menengitis; Marjorie, married Donald Skinner,
  two daughters, Doris Ann Alexander and Betty Thompson; Robert Beldon, married Lois
  Holmes, two daughters, Bobbie Davis, and Joyce Lawrence; Mary Alice, married Milton
  Nelson, one daughter, Carol Kloss.
                
     Source:Chosen Land - Barber County, Kansas,  pg. 141 
     Submitted by: Mary Alice Cook Nelson