Dudes and Sagebrushers 



29 



This observation applies to motoring anywhere at any time. Unless he 

 knows the person who begs for a ride, the motorist endangers himself 

 and his car. The newspapers are full of reports of kind-hearted motor 

 ists being killed or injured by tramps 

 whom they kindly picked up for a ride on 

 their way; and there are many more 

 stories of cars being stolen by these bums. 

 It is no longer a rare occurrence for 

 women to steal cars from people who 

 have befriended them, and often these 

 days we hear of women hikers using guns 

 or knives in taking possession of cars and 

 their contents. 



In the national parks the tramp is re 

 garded with suspicion. If he appears at 

 the gates afoot, he must produce a bedroll 

 or a roll of greenbacks with which to 

 rent a bed at the hotels or camps, or the rangers turn him back. The 

 same thing applies to women afoot. However, most of the tramps get 

 into the parks in the cars of the bona fide Sagebrushers, and the rangers' 

 problems arise usually when the bums seek beds or meals for which 

 they have no money to pay. Hotel, camp, and lodge owners in the parks 

 are authorized to give their night watchmen keys to vacant tents and 

 cabins, with instructions to examine them at different times during the 

 night, and if anyone is found therein to take very essential parts of any 

 clothing lying around to hold until the rangers can arrest the person 

 who is stealing a bed. 



One morning the rangers had a call from Old Faithful that two 

 tramps had been caught in a cabin of the lodge there. Their trousers, 

 shoes, and hats had been taken by the night watchman and they had 

 come barefooted with blankets wrapped around them to the ranger 

 station to tell about their predicament. They were from good families 

 in Racine, Wisconsin, and were students of the state university. They 

 had plenty of good references. They wanted their clothes back. They 

 told this story: they had agreed to start from Madison with eight dol 

 lars apiece and go to San Diego on that amount, bumming rides, meals, 

 and lodging as they came west. They had not intended to include 

 Yellowstone Park in their itinerary, but upon arriving at Cheyenne they 

 begged a ride with a congenial party headed for the park and hastily 

 revised their plans. Upon arriving at the park gate, the crowded con 

 dition of the car, the evident feeling on the part of the owner that he 

 would like to get rid of his guests, and the registration of the two from 

 a town widely separated from the home of the car owner attracted the 



