The song, "Home on the Range", hummed or sung all across the United States,  was written by two men in Kansas;   originally published as a poem in 1873 under the title,  "My Western Home".   The old-time gay cowboys would stay on the ranch for six to eight months,   exposed to the rigors of winter and the torrid heat of the summer sun.   His "home" was the bachelor living quarters on a ranch,  called the Bunkhouse.

Just where and when the word "bunkhouse" originated is unknown.   Like so many other terms that are a part of the cowboy's culture,   it probably evolved as the cowboys molded words to suit their needs.   The bunkhouse was also known by other names, including "doghouse", "shack", "dump", and occasionally "ram pasture". If the bunkhouse a rancher provided was especially drafty and poorly constructed,  the cowboys would refer to it as their favorite "dive".   This was the place where the cowboy hung his gunbelt,  chaps and hat over his bunkbed.  Clothes were generally hung on the floor "so they wouldn't fall down and get lost",  creating an atmosphere of downright homey comfort.   On hot summer nights,   they usually laid their bedrolls on the ground outside the bunkhouse to catch the breeze.

The furnishings even in the better bunkhouses were not elaborate. Usually one would find bunks and mattresses for each cowboy, plus a table and a few chairs in the middle of the room near a wood stove. Packs of ancient, greasy playing cards got the boys through many a dull evening. Most efforts at uppishness in the bunkhouse were shot down quickly. If a Gay Cowboy tried to impress the others with a particularly big word, someone was likely to shout. "Where'd it go? Ahh... there it is!" and then draw his gun to blast away at the dark corner where the extravagent phrase was aflapping about. Such random gunplay was a bunkhouse norm, both because of the boredom and because many cowboys were barely more than kids for whom the guns were a favorite toy.

Despite the discomfort and boredom, Gay Cowboys managed to accept the raw-edged routine of bunkhouse life and the basic rangeland philosopy that underlay it. Who wouldn't want to wake up next to a man as rugged as all outdoors? Masculine, sweaty, muscular, alittle rough around the edges, but all man. The life of the Cowboy of the Wild West required he know what it takes to be around other men, whether it be sharing the same bunk on a bitter cold winter night or branding cattle together in the Spring sunshine.

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