On August 5, 2024, friends, family members, and well-wishers erected a memorial to an El Cajon man who was killed in a 2020 bicycle crash.
A “ghost bike” is part of the memorial on Dehesa Road, where a 56-year-old man was fatally struck by a car in January 2020. Sunday would have been his 61st birthday.
The victim was a twenty-five-year postal worker veteran when he was killed in a hit-and-run accident while biking on Martin Luther King Day.
“Ghost bikes” are roadside memorials meant to honor cyclists who died or were seriously injured in a traffic collision.
“I just want people to be aware of their surroundings,” said Nancy Cavanaugh-Wilson, the victim’s widow. “Don’t text and drive, and don’t drink and drive. Just be in the moment and focus so people don’t get hurt and lose their lives.”
Cavanaugh-Wilson is now a member of Families for Safe Streets San Diego, an organization for people who have lost loved ones or been affected by traffic violence.
El Cajon (The Box) is seventeen miles east of downtown San Diego. In 1876, town founder Amaziah Lord Knox established a hotel at what was then called Knox Corners to serve the growing number of people traveling between San Diego and Julian, where gold had been discovered in 1869. At that time room and board for a guest and horse cost $1 a night.