Rip Van Winkle was a character in a short story by the American writer Washington Irving.In the story,Rip lives in a little town in the Hudson Valley,in New York,in the 1770s,around the time of the American Revolution.Rip went out hunting one day,took a nap under a tree, and fell asleep. He woke up 20 years later to find himself a citizen of a brand-new country--the United State of America.