When I was a kid, my parents used to taunt my brother and I by bringing home the catalog from Schwinn, but we were always given hand-me-downs from the neighbor family who had about eight kids, all older than us. We lusted after those old Schwinns!We all thought Schwinn was top dog. I had a stingray new - 1968. I was 10 and in love.
This EXACT bike:
Eventually I was tall enough to ride some other sort of used bike my parents how gotten ahold of, not a Schwinn but it had the same styling, banana seat, high sissy bar, etc. It was a 5-speed and it was purple. I was finally the coolest kid in town, at least in my mind.
My next bike was an "adult" bike, a 10-speed Columbia drop-bar road bike. I managed to miss the whole BMX craze that replaced the banana seat era. Never saw the attraction once I got the 10-speed.
