The first homesteaders moved into the Jackson Hole valley in the 1880s. Many of these settlers quickly realized that the valley was poorly suited to raising crops and livestock. At the same time, wealthy Easterners wanted to enjoy the western experience. As a result, many ranchers turned to hosting "dudes" rather than raising cattle.

Dave Spalding established a homestead near Phelps Lake in 1903. The picturesque setting could not make up for poor, rocky soils that were unsuitable for agriculture. In 1906, he turned the land over to Louis Joy who partnered with Princeton-educated Struthers Burt opening the first dude ranch in Jackson Hole. Joy and Burt brought together western ranching experience and eastern connections to attract visitors. The ranch earned its name from the abbreviation of Joy’s last name to “JY”.

Experienced dudes, Struthers Burt and Dr. Horace Carncross opened Jackson Hole’s second dude ranch in 1912, the Bar BC Ranch. Burt described dude ranching as cattle ranching modified to care for “dudes”—visitors willing to pay handsomely for a quaint cowboy experience. During its peak years, as many as 50 dudes could stay at a monthly rate of $300 each. Only six dudes stayed the first summer, but the Bar BC soon became Jackson Hole’s most famous dude ranch.

The White Grass Ranch opened to dudes in 1919 becoming the valley’s third dude ranch. As a young man, Harold Hammond came to Jackson Hole in 1901 to work as a wrangler for the Reclamation Service. In 1913 he homesteaded the White Grass Ranch. George Tucker Bisham, an Easterner who had spent summers at the Bar BC Ranch, joined Hammond two years later filing for an adjacent homestead. They quickly discovered tourism was more profitable than cattle ranching, opening their doors to visitors as early as 1919.

Credits and Sources:

United States. National Park Service. "Dude Ranches." National Parks Service. June 25, 2015. Accessed June 26, 2015. http://www.nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/dude.htm.

United States. National Park Service. "JY Dude Ranch." National Parks Service. June 25, 2015. Accessed June 26, 2015. http://www.nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/jyran.htm.

United States. National Park Service. "Bar BC Dude Ranch." National Parks Service. June 25, 2015. Accessed June 26, 2015. http://www.nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/bcran.htm.

United States. National Park Service. "White Grass Dude Ranch." National Parks Service. June 25, 2015. Accessed June 26, 2015.http://www.nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/wgran.htm.