Indianapolis had more to do with the early formation of America, how Americans eat and how they move  themselves about, than any other city in the United States. As I will be showing you, no other city has had a bigger impact   on the evolution and landscape  of America than Indianapolis.

This understanding begins in 1834 when, on its way to the Mississippi River, the National Road from Washington DC crossed the White River in Indianapolis. It was this development that opened up the frontier of the  West where there were no roads. While there were other bridges along the National Road that preceded and followed the White River crossing, none of them engendered a riverfront that would help build the  West. As half a million fortune seekers, used the covered bridge to get to California and Oregon, soon mills and factories were built near it. 

They used the White River to power the water wheels at their production facilities. And then the mills used the bridge to send the flour (for making bread), and cornmeal they had ground  to the people of the West. 

By 1862 Kingan Pork formed along the White River. Nor was it long before they became the world’s largest pork producer with operations on both sides of the waterway.  Their business took off because pork, a staple of the American diet in the 1800s, did not require refrigeration. It could be preserved with salt. Because this was so, they could also ship their meat over the National Road bridge to St Louis, Kansas City, and all the brand new markets in the West. 

It would take a few decades, but Kingan shifted the American diet to beef when one of its engineers, George Stockman, invented mechanical refrigeration in 1868. It was this development that made meat lockers and refrigerated rail cars possible. Because of Stockman’s invention, the production of meat shifted away from Indianapolis.

Soon, Chicago became America's new meat supplier. This was so because fresh meat no longer required cattle drives to get to its stockyards. As rail brought live animals to Chicago, property owners all over the West began to cordon off their land with a new invention, barbed wire. It was this that brought about the end of the cowboy era. In the end, it was Stockman’s invention that put Chicago on the path to becoming one of the leading cities in America.

A year after it invented refrigeration, in 1869 the Transcontinental Railroad connected San Francisco to Chicago. When this happened, Kingan’s pork market expanded even more. It was able to use nearby Union Station (two-blocks away), the east coast rail transfer station, to get its pork and bacon (Kingan was the first to mass produce bacon) to the Windy City and then San Francisco. 

At the same time, Van Camp, located a block from Kingan and the river was busy shipping millions of  cans of pork and beans to the hungry Americans of the West. With the help of the National Road Bridge and then Union Station, they would go on to become the world’s largest canned foods producer. 

In addition to sending food to the West,  Indianapolis also helped put an end to slavery. This was so because from 1854 to 1859, thousands of people used the National Road bridge to get to Kansas to establish residency there. Their purpose in doing so was to affect the vote on slavery. In 1861 when Kansas entered the Union as a free state, many of its citizens came from above the Mason-Dixon line.

Besides gold seekers, Indianapolis also sent  tens of millions of people to relocate in the West, to begin a new life. While this migration began with the  National Road Bridge in the 1850s, this movement shot into overdrive with its Union Station in 1869. The first train station in the world to serve as a hub for all the different train lines in a city, by 1870, two million people a year were using it to get to the Transcontinental Railroad.   

In 1890, Diamond Chain opened its doors. Diamond Chain’s importance to the advancement of civilization  cannot be overstated. Without chain, all that motors do is spin. They do not do any work. 

While block chain had been invented in 1880, its  use was  limited because it was so expensive to make. In devising a way to mass produce chain, Diamond Chain made it affordable for the masses. The first beneficiary of this manufacturing breakthrough was the bicycle. This made possible the pedal machine with equal sized wheels, we know today (penny farthings, huge front wheel, small back wheel, do not have chain) that took over America. Fondly associated with the Gay 90s, because Diamond Chain had made them affordable, bicycles were a part of the culture and everywhere to be seen. 

Car engines also need chain. As do airplanes, motorboats and the assembly line, etc. As Diamond Chain led what is called the Second Industrial Revolution, its factory grew to be one of the biggest on the planet,. This also made   Indianapolis the high-tech center of the world. 

In many ways, Indianapolis was like the Silicon Valley of the USA. Because of Diamond Chain, many of the nation’s best mechanical minds came here. It attracted. America’s top machinists and  metal workers, a fair number of whom would go on to collaborate with the nascent automobile industry that was also exploding in Indianapolis. 

Known by many industry observers as the birthplace of the automobile, Indianapolis was also arguably, the origin of America’s  first automobile, the CH Black of 1891. This, as it was also home to 97 different car manufactures.  

Well, before Detroit, Indianapolis gave us the first automobile showroom, the first auto row, the first car headlights (making it possible to work in a factory after the sun went down). And the first automobile test track, the Indy 500 Motor speedway, etc., etc.

The Indy 500 race track made  Indianapolis the center of the automobile industry. This was so because many car makers set up shop here so they could test their new innovations on the speedway. It became a proving ground for many of the safety and performance features we take for granted today. 

A few years later, in the same way it connected California to the East Coast with wagons and then trains, it made it possible for cars to reach California with the Lincoln Highway, the first coast to coast car highway. The long distance, road building frenzy this spawned that continues to this day, changed the landscape of America forever.  

Coming full circle, connecting California to the East Coast with bicycles is Indianapolis’s next step in the evolution of America.  It has already begun with the labyrinth of greenways that feed the only Downtown Greenway in the world, the Indianapolis Cultural Trail. As the heartbeat of the city, the ICT has revitalized the Crossroads of America, and brought about a building boom that remains unchecked. Soon the renaissance this has brought about  will expand to other cities along the National Bicycle Greenway route from San Francisco to Washington DC.

Thank you Indianapolis

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I am feeling so honored that I have had my fundraiser blessed by who I have come to learn is the highest authority on Indianapolis cycling. As the publicist for Bicycle Garage, Connie Szabo Schmucker, lives, bikes and breathes her job at a level beyond amazing. Also as an active and very highly respected member of the Mayor’s Bicycle Advisory Committee, she is well informed on pretty much every issue facing cyclists in this monstrous city of 368,000 square miles (San Francisco is 49 square miles).

I learned about Connie while I was living in Ireland and collecting info about Indianapolis for our 2014 National Mayor’s Ride. Even back then she got me connected to all the right people as she also told me about the issues facing Indy bike riders at the time.

She always seems one step ahead of any issue I may have wanted to bring attention to. When, for example, I wanted the bus people to build bicycles into their rapid transit bus line on Washington St. to the airport (I talked to the chief traffic engineer, who came on his bicycle, and he showed me there was just not enough room for cars, buses AND bicycles even after a lane of traffic had been removed), Connie was already talking to Indiana State Senator, Andrea Hunley before I could place this need before her.

It is no wonder, whenever bicycles are in the news, Connie is called upon. for her opinion. Thank you Connie for legitimizing my fundraiser with your support. As the real cyclist that you are, thank you for knowing how important my bicycles are to my own well being and to Indianapolis cycling in general.

When you ride the ICT north through the Indiana/Purdue University campus,

after you reach Michigan St,, the next major intersection is Indiana Avenue. After you make your way through the island,

a right turn will take you to the Madam Walker about two blocks away. While a left will take you to the hospitals on 10th St and the all new bridge over Fall Creek.

At the colorful stained glass sculpture at the corner of Indiana Avenue and St. Clairs St., you will need to stop and cross Indiana Avenue at the light controlled intersection and continue against traffic on the ICT. Also at the sculpture, you can turn right and after you cross busy West Street, four blocks away, another long block will take you to the Indy Canal!

As you ride against traffic toward 10th, on your left, behind the black wrought iron fence is an apartment complex mostly made up of students. On both sides of you are thousands of new plants.

Before you reach next major intersection, University Blvd., a shopping center will appear on your right. it is filled with restaurants and eateries from many different ethnic persuasions.

From University Blvd., the trail continues for a quarter of a mile before it reaches 10th St. Where is curves to pass in front of the hospitals, is where this video begins.

The video ends across the street from the brand new 16 Tech bridge.

Because Indianapolis is the most centrally located city in America, in making the National Bicycle Greenway real, if there was one building we could buy here for our home office, where would that be? I have been asked this question by investors interested in helping us build our Coast to Coast Bikeway. Here is how I have answered that question.

What could be a better option than the blue, curve-shaped 38-story Marriott? An iconic construction, it stands apart from the rest of the skyline to welcome visitors to the city.

A powerful billboard with endless possibilities for our message, it is located next to the White River in the cradle of Indianapolis and arguably all of Westward expansion.

Far more than just having an office here at this location, if we owned the building, we could use its massive command of the skyline to achieve two things. Both of which feed each other. Obviously, the words, National Bicycle Greenway along with a few of the many projects we will undertake, will regularly be painted on to its East facing edifice.

In addition, on the other side, we will establish this part of the White River and Indianapolis as the:

Looking down on the White River, these words will appear on the west facing side of the building. They will look out upon the site of the first cabin cabin in Indianapolis, McCormick’s cabin of 1820, also determined to be the geographic center of Indiana. Adjacent to it, from 1834 to 1902 stood the the bridge that conquered the West, the National Road wood covered bridge.

As a water crossing, it not only sent half a million people to California and Oregon in search of riches, opportunity and land, it also engendered a riverfront industry that would help build the West. To far away lands, the bridge was able to feed the West by shipping the cornmeal and flour the river’s water wheels ground up.

Also very close to the Marriott, was G.C. Van Camp & Son, which besides feeding the Civil War, troops, was the world's largest canned foods packer. Van Camp used the National Road Bridge to send canned fruit and tomatoes to the new population centers that were forming in the West.

Here also was the mammoth Kingan & Co., which after it opened in 1862 became the world’s largest producer of pork. At a point in time when the only meat Americans ate was pork because it could be preserved with salt, for several generations the West got its meat from Indianapolis. Here, where civilization ended, Kingan supplied many of the wagon trains that used the National Road bridge to cross into the frontier with dried meat for their journey. Kingan also used the bridge to put flesh food on the dinner tables of St. Louis and the Kansas territory

Once it is understood that "Indy’s Impact on America’s Lifestyle and Landscape has no Equal", people from all over the nation and the world will flock to our airport, the top rated airport in North America, to get a firsthand look. And when they see we are a happy city dominated by bicycles and the only downtown Greenway in the world, the internationally celebrated Indianapolis Cultural Trail (which accesses the Marriott), we will have planted the seed for what is possible the world around. This as they take this message back to their own cities and towns