D&D ranger = Texas Ranger?

[Desdichado]

Could Strider have been based on (or the concept influenced by) the Texas Rangers? After all, the Texas Rangers were around and legendary for over a century before Strider hit a page.

Not likely. For one thing, you haven't yet presented anything about the Texas Rangers that is unique to them. For another thing, although they were legendary in the US, they probably were much more understated in the UK, and there's no indication that Tolkien ever had any interest in the American west, or the old Lone Ranger TV show, or anything like that. Not only that, he didn't have to borrow from the Texas Rangers for Strider; he's already got plenty of good old-fashioned European predecessors to build on. If anything, I think Strider is a bit of King Arthur and Robin Hood combined and amplified.

 

[TheEvil]

From some of the talking, it seem like the texas rangers are more of a throwback to medieval times people that were the inspiration for the class...

 

[Meowzebub]

I know the Texans will hate to hear it, but think about the other professional sports team sharing that name and you start to get closer to the source. the New York Rangers. Rangers were the independant backwoods men that served as scouts and skirmishers during the French and Indian War (Queen Anne's War) in Upper New York and Canada. Roger's Rangers gained a fair amount of fame, also called the King's Rangers.

Think of Last of the Mohicans and every other JF Cooper book and you get at the heart of the original Rangers.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

I'm sure the concept goes beyond even pre-revolutionary rangers. I'd imagein that there must be some European examples (explorers in Africa and India, for example). If anyone has any specific sources fro that sort of thing, I'd love to hear it.

As for Tlokien, I'd imagine its a common source kind of thing. The Texas Rangers are an evolution of previous wilderness protectors, and Tolkien was working from similar concepts as well.

 

[kenobi65]

And what about Ranger Rick?

http://www.nwf.org/kidzone/kzPage.cfm?siteId=3&departmentId=81

He's a protector of the wilds; I'm sure that there was some subliminal inspiration for the D&D ranger that came from him!

 

[darkelfo]

Those who have studied the history of the Southwest know that the Texas Rangers of old had a reputation for being corrupt and racist. Not all of them, of course, but extrajudicial murders and lynchings were common and have been well-documented.

I'd hardly want to play a character modeled after that aspect of the Texas Rangers -- unless he was an evil ranger.

Aragorn on the other hand seems like a great rolemodel.

 

[diaglo]

Aragorn on the other hand seems like a great rolemodel.

lie, cheat, underhanded...

prideful

throwing thousands of lives away against an enemy on his own whim...


yeah, the perfect role model.

 

[S'mon]

I think Rangers go back a very long way in Britain, maybe more as the King's elite scouts/light infantry rather than independent operators - old military regiments like the Royal Irish Rangers. I'm quite certain Tolkien wasn't using 'Western' Ranger roots for his Rangers, who were protectors/defenders, although both come from the same source, as indeed do the Airborne Rangers et al.

 

[Felon]

Not likely. For one thing, you haven't yet presented anything about the Texas Rangers that is unique to them. For another thing, although they were legendary in the US, they probably were much more understated in the UK, and there's no indication that Tolkien ever had any interest in the American west, or the old Lone Ranger TV show, or anything like that. Not only that, he didn't have to borrow from the Texas Rangers for Strider; he's already got plenty of good old-fashioned European predecessors to build on. If anything, I think Strider is a bit of King Arthur and Robin Hood combined and amplified.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK, so that theory was shot down. But how about my theory that Walker, Texas Ranger, was actually based on Strider?

Stride...walk....Chuck NORiss...ArrigORN...it's all so obvious if you think about it.

 

[Lasher Dragon]

Those who have studied the history of the Southwest know that the Texas Rangers of old had a reputation for being corrupt and racist.

How are D&D Rangers not racist? Hell I joke about them all the time - I play a halfling rogue 6/racist 6 (oops I mean ranger 6).