El Cerrito’s Greatest Threat:

A Satirical Look Back at Bicycle Safety by Michael Doan

It’s time—I am known by my friends in southern Virginia as a gentle, proper law-abiding citizen who never offends anyone.

Now, it’s time to uncover my history, with a secret I have held on to for years about my criminal past.

It happened in 1954 in El Cerrito, California, a sleepy suburb of San Francisco. While most officers wasted their time on bank holdups, murders or household beatings, one brave policeman decided to attack the real mortal danger in postwar America: Children on bicycles.

After school, other 12-year-old boys were watching Space Patrol on television or shooting rubber bands at their little sisters. I was industriously earning money delivering newspapers on my paper route.

Mike Doan, circa age 12.

One afternoon in, the dutiful officer ordered me to stop and get off my bike. I did not have a license plate on my bike! And my noisemaker to warn pedestrians was improper. And my light didn’t work. (Why did I need a light? And what good was a license to identify your bike if it could easily be snipped off if it the bike was stolen?)

He wrote out a citation and ordered me to go to court on Saturday. About 20 other children also showed up. Today, there would be parents and lawyers galore, but I didn’t see any of either. Back then, parents never knew or cared what their kids were doing.

A panel of teenage judges sat behind the big table normally used for murder and robbery cases. Did this whole thing stem from a high school civics class’s term project gone mad?

With her gavel, the head judge sentenced me to ….write an essay about bicycle safety.

Afterward, the 20 of us waited in line with our bikes to get licenses, and I remember one kid threatening a fight as we jockeyed for a place in line. By the way, when was the last time you saw 20 children with bicycles?

I don’t recall my 6-year-old sister being prosecuted for her tricycle.

That wasn’t quite the end of my career of crime. I remember shooting at cars once—with a squirt gun. A Korean War veteran wasn’t amused and lectured me about how he didn’t like to be shot at. Good point.

Well, I will admit I don’t remember forgetting to get a license on my car in future years. I found out that the town ended its requirement for bike registration as late as 2014. But my parents, who kept mum during my predicament, told me later that the citation was ridiculous. I agree.

(Editor’s note: This column, writtenfor two Virginia newspapers, was inspired by a photo of the license displayed recently on social media by the El Cerrito Historical Society.)