The construction of “childhood”, just like any other history, is defined by continuity, context, contingency, and conflict (Mintz 2016). The varying social, cultural, economic and political values surrounding “children” across time has helped solidify “childhood” and “youth” as a complex, social construction. Time periods, cultures, values, and geographical spaces mold the built landscape. Humans’ reactions to these materially and conceptually built spaces, thus, reinforces systems of oppression. This concept is known as the social-spatial dialectic. Conceptions of “childhood”, in summary, reveal the recursive nature of the social spatial dialectic.

Starting in the mid- nineteenth century, economic and gender relations began to shift towards the singular notion of women as caretakers and children as students, “The new model of family life was closely linked to ideas prescribing separate spheres for women and men…mothers…were to make the home a domestic shelter furnishing emotional support for husband and children, child rearing and character formation…”  (MacLeod 1998, 9). This, in turn, developed a new sense of domesticity that centered on the preoccupation of child rearing for white middle class families (Marsh 1989). These shifting roles of men, women, and children were a result of rapid urbanization caused by a shift from an agrarian to industrial society. Middle class white men, in particular, felt that suburbs could be the antidote to the “evil temptations” of urban life brought on by foreign immigration and industrialization (Marsh 1989). They believed that city life had eroded family unity and encouraged family members to become individualistic. Therefore, how a space was designed to accommodate children reinforced how children used it and thus perpetuated certain notions of ‘childhood’ and developed the conceptual qualities of the place. The construction of single family homes in suburbia and the construction of tenement housing (e.g. kitchenettes) reflect the vastly different notions of childhood for children of certain classes and races during the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The ‘ideal’ child for creating a ‘home’ space was one that was white and middle class. Other children, particularly poor African American children, were not taken into account in regards to the development, construction, and maintenance of their housing units because they were not the ‘ideal’ child.

Mobility patterns – from rural to urban areas, from the South to North, from native lands to reservations or concentration camps – showcased how social inequalities were being imprinted on the landscape at a macro-level from the 1850s to 1950s. At the micro-level, people experienced social inequalities through the movement of their bodies through every day public spaces. Spaces and the meanings associated with them were constantly evolving in the city and children, particularly young girls, low income individuals, and those of ethnic and racial minorities, needed to be constantly on alert and street-conscious. As pedestrians, horses, and cyclists were competing for space on the newly crowded roadways in the late 19^th century and early 20^th century, accidents and fatalities began to increase and resulted in the formation of new traffic laws to separate horses and pedestrians from cyclists. Additionally, as cycling increased in popularity, cyclists began to complain about “…muddy, rough, and often dangerously rutted roads” (Strange & Brown 2000, 612). The League of American Wheelmen (L.A.W.) was formed in 1880 and they made it their mission to fight for the use of bicycles in public spaces such as Central Park in New York City and demand national and local government to take responsibility for the condition of roads (Finison 2014).

Since this two-wheeled invention increased individual movement and sense of freedom, the expansion of its usage to young girls and women, the working class, and racial and ethnic minorities caused significant societal tension. The physical layout of cities and towns was transformed due to the bicycle and thus influenced how all citizens interacted with public and private space. However, who had access to bicycles and associated infrastructure was not uniform between the 1860s and 1950s. Social inequalities and associated unequal access to public spaces and infrastructure are produced as a result of how privilege and power manifest themselves within the socio-spatial dialectic across time. In other words, those with power and control in society get to dictate the material formation and evolution of spaces through time often resulting in segregation or unequal access to certain societal needs. As Alderman and Modlin note, “race and landscape are mutually constructed in consequential and often discriminatory ways (2014, 274). This translates to how individual groups and bodies, especially children, move through particular spatial environments and therefore are made aware of how power and control accentuated in their built environment enforces discriminatory practices.

For young, black females in New Orleans during Jim Crow, creating mental maps of where they were ‘safe’ and where they were ‘not safe’ was needed to navigate the wards and public spaces. Creating mental maps became rather complex due to the fact that “…segregation and race-making in one Jim Crow city might have vastly different rules for the proper ‘place’ for black citizens” (Simmons 2015, 28). By walking through white, black, and interracial neighborhoods, these young girls learned about the connection between race, power, space, and gender. It can be assumed that children (particularly females, racial and ethnic minorities, and the low-income) riding their bicycles engaged in the same type ‘mental mapping’ process to ensure that they could safely navigate their everyday geographies.

Another concrete example of how racialized landscapes manifested themselves can be observed in Robert Wright’s experience as a paper boy who utilized the bicycle as his method of transportation during the Jim Crow Era. Wright was made aware, through his skin color, that white men had power over the physical roads he traveled on.

“One day, while I was delivering packages in the suburbs, my bicycle tire was punctured. I walked along the hot, dusty road, sweating and leading my bicycle by the handle-bars. A car slowed at my side. ‘What’s the matter, boy?’ a white man called. I told him my bicycle was broken and I was walking back to town.’That’s too bad,’ he said. ‘Hop on the running board.’ He stopped the car. I clutched hard at my bicycle with one hand and clung to the side of the car with the other. ‘All set?’ ‘Yes, sir,’ I answered. The car started. It was full of young white men. They were drinking. I watched the flask pass from mouth to mouth. ‘Wanna drink, boy?’ one asked. I laughed, the wind whipping my face. Instinctively obeying the freshly planted precepts of my mother, I said:’Oh, no!’ The words were hardly out of my mouth before I felt something hard and cold smash me between the eyes. It was an empty whisky bottle. I saw stars, and fell backwards from the speeding car into the dust of the road, my feet becoming entangled in the steel spokes of my bicycle” (Wright 1937).