Chicago Tribune, August 1, 1897.[Click on the clipping above if you can’t make out the fine print.] A lot of bicyclists today pride themselves on their manifest moral superiority to the benighted “cagers” in their wasteful and dangerous automobiles. This is not unlike the smug glow that warms the hearts of many Canadians when they look south at the barbarians across the border. In both cases, it’s largely a rationalization of relative weakness. Of course, it’s historically nonsensical to imagine Canada existing in the absence of the U.S., but there was a time when the bicycle was the top predator of the urban traffic food chain. It didn’t look so virtuous back then.