In 1892, a song celebrated “a bicycle built for two.” More than a century later, a campaign for a university is upping the ante with an offer of bicycles built for a hundred.

The University of Dayton, in Dayton, Ohio, is promising 100 incoming freshmen free bikes in exchange for pledges to forgo bringing cars to campus for the first two years they are enrolled. The program was being promoted to the freshmen members of the Class of 2017 in a campaign by an agency named 160 Over 90, which is based in Philadelphia and also has an office in Newport Beach, Calif.

The campaign has included a section of the university’s Web site and postcards inserted in admission packets. The students were asked a teaser question, “When is two greater than four?”; those whose curiosities were piqued could learn more about the program, which was portrayed as “protecting the planet two wheels at a time.”

The free bicycles, which the University of Dayton is purchasing from a company named Linus Bike, complement an initiative that the school began two years ago, offering students a chance to participate in a bicycle-sharing program. (The freshmen receiving the free bikes are not obliged to share them, but it is expected that many will do so, at least occasionally.)