Hey, dude!

Met and spent a good amount of time with a guy in the late 1980s who was from Irvine which, I learned, is in southern California. He made me laugh a lot, taught me much, and I will be forever grateful to him. My SoCal pal used the term 'dude' with all and sundry. Also, memorably, 'chump dust' for cocaine. Awesome, dude -- with and without the comma.
Anyway, although the David Bowie song All the Young Dudes made famous in 1972 by Mott the Hoople is unaccountably absent, here now is the story of dude - its rise, its role, its rich history as a word: Guardian.