Inside the divorce ranches where wealthy women kept their splits secret and ex-wives spent time with cowboys By SONYA GUGLIARA FOR DAILYMAIL.COM Published: 03:14 GMT, 17 March 2025 | Updated: 03:20 GMT, 17 March 2025 e-mail View comments While shotgun weddings are a Las Vegas staple, prominent people once flocked to Sin City and Reno, Nevada in pursuit of the exact opposite of marriage. From the 1930s to the 1970s, celebrities and socialites from across the country were eager for a 'Reno-vation' - six-week stay at a luxurious dude ranch while awaiting divorce.
Nevada was known for having more relaxed divorce laws than most other states, but Great Depression-era efforts to save the state's economy added fuel to the fire. In fact, providing divorces was an earlier draw to the state than even the lure of Vegas. 'Nevada got into the migratory divorce game back in the 19th century as a way of getting people to come to the state - there wasn't a whole lot there,' author, artist and historian Peggy Wynne Borgman told the DailyMail.
com. In 1931, Nevada Governor Fred B. Balzar passed two bills that drastically shifted the western state's trajectory.
The first - and better known of the two - was the 'wide-open' gambling bill that made Nevada the first state to legalize betting, contributing to the tourist empire that emerged in Los Vegas. Balzar also gave the greenlight to what was informally known as the 'quickie' divorce act, which loosened the state's already liberal divorce rules a.
