Dude Ranches are guest ranches that cater to visitors and tourists that want to experience the feeling of living the western life style.http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA98/zimmerman/duderanch/frame1.html Dude, in western lingo, is a term that refers to any outsider not of the ranch, and who pays for board and guided tours.http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA98/zimmerman/duderanch/frame1.html Registered dude ranches may be found in 27 of the 50 states, though they tend to be more common in the Western and Central parts of the United States.http://www.duderanches.com/ Dude Ranches are also located in Alberta and British Columbia, Canada. http://www.duderanches.com/ The ranches may offer a variety of activities, such as specialized hunting, hay rides, trail rides, canoeing, fishing and hiking. There may also be skeet shooting, rock climbing, white water rafting, or mountain biking. Some ranches may offer more of the working type ranch activities where the participants help on out a cattle drive or learn ranch skills such as roping and branding. Some dude ranches may offer adult only activities while others cater to families and offer activities for children.http://www.duderanches.com/cgi-bin/duderanch/search.cgi?AdultOnlyVacations=AdultOnlyVacations Dude ranches may offer special services for weddings, have honeymoon packages, as well as accommodate conferences and family reunions.

Dudes ranches that are registered with the Dude Ranchers Association may be found at their website along with descriptions of the ranches and the amenities and activities they offer. Duderanches.com also offers an organized list of ranches and is divided up into ranches by state, activity, skill, western working ranches, guest ranches, and more.

The first dude ranch can be traced back to the 1880’s with the Eaton brothers who bought the Custer Trail Ranch in the Dakota Badlands. http://www.duderanch.org/why.cfm?id=136 They were so taken with living the western experience that they wrote to all their friends back East and were soon flooded with visitors. In 1886, after a wild fire and a harsh winter caused the brothers to review their books, they found that they had given out 2,200 free meals the year before. http://www.duderanch.org/why.cfm?id=136 Guests, realizing that so many visitors were beginning to be a burden, offered to pay. The Eatons accepted and the dude ranch was born.

The Eatons ranch caught the eye of Teddy Roosevelt who also made a trip out to the Custer Trail Ranch. He was so impressed that he bought the Maltese Cross Ranch nearby and became friends with the Eaton brothers. http://www.duderanch.org/why.cfm?id=136 When the Eatons moved their ranch to Wyoming their friends and customers followed. By 1917 they were the largest dude ranch in the country. http://www.duderanch.org/why.cfm?id=136

During the 1920s, as railroad and automobiles made traveling and vacationing easier, dude ranches spread across the west. Ranchers at the time were struggling with low cattle prices and natural disasters. They were seeking ways to make ends meet, without giving up their way of life. http://xroads.virginia.edu/~MA98/zimmerman/duderanch/frame1.html The dude ranch offered them a way to do this and in 1926 the Dude Ranchers Association was formed.