On this day, May 20, in 1899, a New York City cab driver became the Þrst person to be stopped and jailed for speeding in the United States.

Jacob German, 26, a taxi cabdriver for the Electric Vehicle Co., was traveling along Manhattan’s Lexington Avenue in what was called a horseless carriage. A policeman on a bicycle pulled German over and charged him with driving at the “breakneck speed” of 12 mph on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan.