I showed this photograph to my class the other day, and also shared with some of the some of the staff and volunteers at Federal Hall and Grant’s Tomb because I knew the rangers and others would get a kick out of it. Here we see cyclists in front of the Tomb in 1898, just one year after the structure’s completion. The reason I showed it to class was because a group founded in 1880 called The League of American Wheelmen was largely responsible for the Good Roads Movement that led to better highways across the country. The group still exists 140 years later under the more-inclusive moniker League of American Bicyclists.

(image/NYPL Digital)