The term cowboy, according to Webster's Dictionary, is "a hired hand, especially in the western United States, who tends cattle and performs many duties on horse back". There are still many cowboys living and working in the United States these days, although they may occasionally trade their horse for a pickup truck or a 4-wheeler. Most of these cowboys still live by the same codes and standards as the cowboys of the Old West.
The cowboy image has changed somewhat at different times over the past, thanks partly to changing times and partly to the motion picture industry.
The original cowboys were Civil War soldiers who had no home to return to and started drifting to the west. The West was wide open territory and these men only owned what they could carry on horseback. Ranchers would hire them to tend to their herds and to round up the wild and loose cattle on the range. When it was time to sell the beef these "cowboys" would round up the herds and drive them to the markets many miles away.
Although the era of the cattle drives only lasted about 30 years, the cowboys who herded those cattle made a huge impression on American History and have been the center of much folklore. The American Hero that we call "cowboy" has less to do with Wranglers, boots, and hats and more to do with a passion for life and for living it to the fullest. We see the "cowboy" as someone who was free to roam the wide open spaces of the Western Prairie with no boundaries or fences to stop him.
Those are the qualities that we hang on to as Americans today. Perhaps that's why western fashions never go out of style and we still love to listen to country western music. It's why we collect and cherish the relics and fashions of the days of the cowboy's west.
However, you don't need to don a pair of Wranglers and own a cowboy hat or a pair of cowboy boots to live like a cowboy. You don't even have to listen to country western music.
Living like a cowboy is to always wear the "white hat", to have that same passion for life and live your life to the fullest. That is the legacy that the cowboys have given us.