A World of Good

 "With the advent of the automobile, bicycles became all but a thing of the past and disease, especially stomach and intestinal troubles, increased in alarming measure. Medical men in studying this unnatural occurrence attributed the cause to the lack of exercise generally among automobile owners. As a remedy for prevailing conditions they advocated more exercise, especially bicycle riding. Most parents appreciate the value of such exercise for the children, both boys and girls, by supplying them with bikes, but overlook the fact that a few miles a day on a wheel would do themselves a world of good." (Long Beach Telegram and Long Beach Daily News, 1922)

Little more than two decades earlier, bicycles and bicycle riding were being blamed for a multitude of health maladies, everything from wide feet to appendicitis to mania of the embryo scorchers. There have been many others over the years, and right up to the present day, but it is good to see that by 1922 the health benefits were also being recognized. Why then, one hundred more years further along, do active transportation advocates still have to fight, tooth and nail, for even a little bit of paint on a roadway surface?

Julie Obear, a bicycle messenger, wearing a hat of the National Women's Party, 1922

(collection of the Library of Congress)