I’m imagining an all-time great biking vibe in San Francisco today, Jan. 29, the first day of no cars on Market Street in San Francisco. Victory laps will be ridden by people who deserve, and maybe slightly-less-than-deserve, the credit.

But the activist I really want to thank, J.S. Conwell, past president of the Cycle Board of Trade, will not be there. If Conwell were alive today, he would be 175 years old. He helped lead the first Market Street protest of its kind, the July 26, 1896, demand for a bike-dominant main thoroughfare.

Conwell’s remarks to the crowd were not brief — attention spans were longer 111 years before the invention of the iPhone — but he was an incredible orator, so please have a little patience.

“The objects of our demonstration as wheelmen are threefold,” Conwell began his 1896 speech for a crowd of thousands, as reported in The Chronicle. “Primarily, to educate us all to a realizing sense of our own strength and possible influence. Secondly, to rejoice with our South Side friends over the improvement of Folsom Street; and lastly, to protest most vigorously against the condition of San Francisco pavements in general and Market Street in particular

“Similar demonstrations in sister cities have resulted in such an awakening of the public mind to public action that today the bicycle is conceded to be the greatest boon of modern invention, if for nothing more than for its accomplishments in the betterment of city streets and country roads.”

One of the hardest parts of spending hours every week in a newspaper archive, is reading about people who start a good fight and don’t get to live to see the finish. Imagine if the Super Bowl were so long that 49ers quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo died of old age at the end of the first quarter, and only his great-great-grandchildren could celebrate the win.

Now replace that analogy with something much more serious. Gay rights. Legalized cannabis. Environmental threats. History is filled with warriors who don’t get to benefit from their work, drawing a final breath without knowing whether they would make a difference at all.

The first San Francisco Bicycle Coalition appearance in The Chronicle was 1971, followed by another high-profile Market Street bike protest in 1972. (“Less Cars, Not More”; “Safe Bike Lanes for Market” read two of the signs.) Judging by the photos, the youngest of the adult activists are now in their mid-70s, hopefully still around to appreciate the Market Street news after nearly five decades of frustration.

I salute all of these pioneers as the mostly passive beneficiary of their efforts. Four years ago, I didn’t own a bike. It’s now my primary form of transportation, including my daily commute via ferry from Alameda to San Francisco.

J.S. Conwell and the next generations of bike activists fought many losing battles, with the occasional win, for more than a century. Those wins included bike lanes throughout Alameda, larger bike carriage on the ferries, and bike lanes on the Embarcadero, Howard, Folsom and Fifth streets, which comprise my entire path to and from work.

The lesson here isn’t sadness or even guilt, but a reminder to embrace those who take a leap of faith in the name of civic progress. And know that wherever you fall on the current political spectrum, you are the beneficiary of people who were considered loons when their activism began.

It’s natural to question a New Radical Idea. Maybe the radical idea is very bad. Maybe it’s just before its time. But let’s agree that it has been a great net positive to live in a city where protesters enthusiastically fight for a future that they have virtually no chance to see.

And when you walk into work on Wednesday, leaving your gloves and helmet on as you stroll through the office so everyone can see you biked to work (this is 100% my move), remember a kind thought for the people who actually made this smug act possible. Especially if they died in the first quarter of the 20th century.

The 1896 coverage of the Market Street bike protest was whimsical, to match the scene. A reported 5,000 bikers pedaled with costumes and colorful lanterns. Floats were built and paraders wore macabre costumes, carrying messages asking city officials to repave the cobblestone street for the benefit of bicyclists and pedestrians alike.

But there was a sense even then that motorized forces would win this battle for the next 124 years. “The cable-cars kept plowing their way through the crowds, and this served to break the parade into a hundred sections,” The Chronicle reported.

J.S. Conwell would run for supervisor in 1896 representing the pro-bicycling interests, lose, then continue to run his bike business in San Francisco for at least a decade. (We’ll leave out the last decade of his life, involved heavily in the Los Angeles auto industry.)

So let this be a day of personal satisfaction, but also gratitude for those who couldn’t be here. And let us give our friend J.S. Conwell the last word:

“In order to be effective, our efforts must be harmoniously directed along the line of reasonable demands,” he told the Market Street crowd in 1896. “Grant this and we may count upon the hearty sympathy and support of two irresistible forces — the people and the press.

“Hearty cooperation will secure the enforcement of our demands and will demonstrate to every well-wisher of our city that ‘where there is a wheel, there is a way.’”

Peter Hartlaub is The San Francisco Chronicle’s pop culture critic. Email: phartlaub@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @PeterHartlaub