The one that caught my attention shows him with a red Sting-Ray from my youth. “I've always loved bicycles, since I was old enough to ride one,” he told me.

The one that caught my attention shows him with a red Sting-Ray from my youth. “I've always loved bicycles, since I was old enough to ride one,” he told me.

The year after I was born, Schwinn introduced the original Sting-Ray after the company realized that California kids had been customizing their bikes to look like motorcycles.

The one that caught my attention shows him with a red Sting-Ray from my youth. “I've always loved bicycles, since I was old enough to ride one,” he told me.

The one that caught my attention shows him with a red Sting-Ray from my youth. “I've always loved bicycles, since I was old enough to ride one,” he told me.

At the height of the C2/C3 Corvette Stingray's cultural influence, the Schwinn Sting-Ray Fastback tried to capture some of the aura for kids to ride around. Your eyes don't deceive you.

Perhaps there were forests. Or ponds. We got on our bikes (mine was a Schwinn Stingray) and headed south and west. Chicago, built on a prairie, has a grid street system. Every mile is a busy street.