Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) pertaining to a small town or the country and the supposedly unsophisticated inhabitants thereof.

1899		Ade Fables in Sl. (1902) 10: Alas, the Rube Town in which she Hung Forth was given over to Croquet, Mush and Milk Sociables.
1900		Flynt & Walton Powers That Prey 179: I’d rather take my chanst with ten o’ these Rube coppers here in Paris ’n with one o’ the fly elbows in York.
1904		A. Lang in L.A. Times 29 Mar. 7: Of course, there is no reason why I should know what a ‘rube town,’ a ‘one stand town,’ [...] and so forth, mean.
1905		‘Hugh McHugh’ Get Next 27: A Reub constable pinched him [...] and threw him in a rural Bastile for the night.
1915		Van Loan ‘The Spotted Sheep’ in Taking the Count 99: The small-town sport, with the rube champion in tow.
1928		Hecht & MacArthur Front Page Act I: It’s just a rube town.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 180: No punk copper or rube sheriff looking for a quick rep was going to put over on him an unexpected frisk.
1940		T. Thursday ‘There’s Hicks In All Trades’ in All Sports Feb. 🌐 It was a typical rube audience, with farmers to the right of you, farmers to the left.
1946		(con. 1910s) J. Thompson Heed the Thunder (1994) 252: Extremely clothes conscious, they had got rid of their rube duds as soon as they were able.
1956		I. Fleming Diamonds Are Forever (1958) 73: The likes of Lucky Luciano are gone from the rube town that flourished.
1976		Time 20 Dec. 17/1: They were an unsolemn pair, the young man who likes his rube image and the impeccably dressed man who looked more like a smooth character actor than a politician of enormous influence .
1985		N. Pileggi Wiseguy (2001) 201: It was the most middle-western, rube thing you ever saw.
2000		Guardian Mag. 13 May 30: One of the upcoming acts was a rube comic, whose stock-in-trade was tightfisted-farmer jokes.
2016		Guardian 15 Aug. 🌐 Trump [...] has taken in millions from his rube supporters, but is not spending the money.