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Authors: Wilson Casey

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Surfer
Around 2000 B.C.E., the Polynesians started surfing. This was around the time of their movement from Asia to the eastern Pacific.
The first-known surfer of the modern era was Duke Kahanamoku, who was born in Waikiki, Hawaii, in 1890. Along with his teenage friends, Kahanamoku formed the first-ever surf club known as Hui Nalu, but commonly called the Beach Boys of Waikiki. “The Duke,” as he was called, became an Olympic champion swimmer and remains a symbol of Hawaii. He is known as “the father of surfing.”
Synagogue
Around 597 B.C.E., according to tradition, the possible first synagogue was Shef ve-Yativ in Nehardea, a city of Babylonia. The first synagogues were very simple buildings and consisted of only one room with benches along the sides of the walls. But unlike temples, there were many of these smaller buildings in different locations. The oldest synagogues, and perhaps the first, probably arose where the Jews were slaves in Babylon (now modern Iraq), but specific details are not clearly known.
System of Measurement
The first system of measurement involved the human body of early man, a natural method for the ancients. During biblical times, the cubit was the length of a forearm or the distance from the tip of the elbow to the end of the middle finger. Half a cubit was called a span and was the distance across the hand from the tip of the thumb to the tip of the little finger. What is now called an inch was the width of a man’s thumb. The distance across a man’s outstretched arms equaled a fathom. The foot-rule started out as the length of a man’s foot.
System of Writing
Around 3400 B.C.E., the first system of writing was picture writing. The ideographic style, which employed pictures as signifiers, was developed in Sumer (present-day southern Iraq) and was primarily used for accounting. This Sumerian picture writing called cuneiform included as many as 1,200 separate ideograms that represented a thing or concept rather than the word for it. The picture presentations were pressed into wet clay with the end of a reed, and the clay was dried to form tablets. The ancient Sumerians also wrote and devised arithmetic based on units of 10, the number of fingers on both hands.
T
Tank
Aside from Leonardo da Vinci’s drawing of a round, tanklike armored wagon in the 1400s, Austrian Gunther Burstyn designed the first cross-country military tank in 1911. Burstyn was an engineering officer of the Austro-Hungarian Army and called his tank the
Motorgeschütz,
which literally meant “motor gun.” It had a swiveling turret and was based on American agricultural tractors. Although it was a practical design, it was rejected by both the Austro-Hungarian and German empires.
Tap Dancer
During the 1840s, tap dancing became popular on the American minstrel circuit. William Henry Lane of Providence, Rhode Island, was the first tap dancer of renowned fame. He was an entertainer who went by the stage name Juba and was billed as the king of all dancers. Lane had mastered his steps by combining jigs and reels with West African giouba, a kind of lively rhythmic dance. He was also the first African American to be the headliner or top billing of a troupe of Caucasian American dancers.
Taxi Cab
In Germany in the early summer of 1897, the Daimler Victoria became the world’s first dedicated taxi cab, equipped with the newly invented taximeter for calculating fare charges to customers. On June 26, 1896, the taxi had been special ordered by a Stuttgart-based haulage operator by the name of Friedrich Greiner from Daimler-Motoren-Gesellschaft in Cannstatt. Upon successful construction, the taxi was supplied to Greiner in May 1897 at the hefty price of 5,530 marks (around $50,000 today)—plus he had to pay rental for the taximeter. A heating system for the rear-seat passengers (another first) was installed in this first taxi, and it had a half-top feature that could be opened in fine weather. Greiner soon renamed his haulage outfit the Daimler Motorized Cab Company, becoming the world’s first motorized taxi business. By 1899, the company had taken delivery of seven Daimler taxis.
Telegraph
On March 3, 1791, French brothers Claude and Ignace Chappe demonstrated the first telegraph. The nonelectrical air telegraph depended on line of sight for communication. The brothers constructed a chain of hilltop and manmade towers about 3 to 6 miles apart, each within the line of sight of two others via a telescope. The towers were outfitted with two wings or movable arms mounted on a crossbeam. By positioning the wings and tilting the crossbeam in different ways, they were able to transmit a coded message along the route of the towers. Different positions represented letters of the alphabet, common words, and numerals. Skilled signalers could transmit messages in a fraction of the time compared to messages delivered by horseback.
Telephone
Between 1850 and 1862, Italian American inventor Antonio Meucci developed at least 30 different models of the first working telephone. Although there’s controversy from the Alexander Graham Bell camp, on June 15, 2002, the United States Congress officially recognized Meucci as the true inventor of the telephone. During the creation of the first telephones, Meucci was too poor to pay the fees to patent his inventions. He had to settle for a legal notice called a caveat that stated he had invented the telephone. Meucci’s first phones were crude and simple devices but could change sound to electricity and back again to sound.
Television
On September 7, 1927, the American inventor Philo T. Farnsworth demonstrated the world’s first working television system with electronic scanning of both the pickup and display devices. Farnsworth, along with his wife and her brother, televised a straight line from one room to another in his San Francisco, California, lab to create the first fully electronic picture. Later that year, they transmitted a puff of cigarette smoke. Many inventors had written about, worked on, or built various electro-mechanical television systems prior to Farnsworth’s demonstration, and the invention of the first television has been disputed adamantly throughout its history.
Tent Revival Meeting
Moses was the first person in history to deliver God’s word using a tent as the focus of the community. He did so around 1500 B.C.E. in a portable tent called the Tabernacle. During a tent revival meeting, as told in the Book of Exodus, people gathered to worship and invite the presence of the Lord. The Tabernacle tent was pitched almost anywhere in the open air, and word of the revival meeting was spread by word of mouth. It wasn’t until the 1700s that great itinerant preachers combed the countrysides in Europe and America with their tent revivals.
Toll Bridge
On May 3, 1654, the world’s first toll bridge opened over the Newbury River in Rowley, Massachusetts. A minimal toll was probably collected primarily by the honor system, with a wooden toll box on both sides of the bridge. The toll was only for animals; pedestrians and riders were permitted free passage. The bridge was on the property of Richard Thorlo (or Thorla, Thorley, or Thurley, depending on the source). Born in England, Thorlo had relocated to the Massachusetts colony. The bridge, built with Thorlo’s own money and toils to provide convenient passage, remained a toll bridge until 1680. The toll money was Thorlo’s to keep.
Toothpaste in a Tube
In 1892, Dr. Sheffield’s Creme Dentifrice was the first packaged toothpaste in a collapsible metal tube, or the compressible tube, as it was sometimes called. Dr. Washington Wentworth Sheffield, a New London, Connecticut, dentist, devised the successful idea. Previously, toothpaste was packaged in porcelain jars. To use, you simply dropped a toothbrush into the jar’s paste and took what you needed … but so did other family members. Sheffield’s tube was both convenient and sanitary. Its air-tightness kept the toothpaste from drying out, while the collapsible tube packaging lowered the overall price of toothpaste and spawned the tooth-cleaning industry.
Top Hat
In 1797, London haberdasher John Hetherington invented the first top hat. The hat was a silk-covered exaggerated variation of a beaver-fur riding hat. It was tall, round, and cylindrical but flat on the top. Story has it that while wearing it, Hetherington was arrested for disturbing the peace by “appearing on the public highway wearing a tall structure of shining lustre and calculated to disturb timid people,” according to newspaper reports. He was found guilty and fined a £500 bond.
Traffic Light
On December 10, 1868, the first traffic light was installed in London, England, at the intersection of George and Bridge Streets outside the British Houses of Parliament. It was a revolving gas-powered lantern with red and green signals. Invented by railroad signal engineer J. P. Knight to control the flow of horse buggies and pedestrians, it was fitted with a lever at the base that was manually turned so the appropriate light faced traffic—red for stop and green for go.
Transatlantic Nonstop Flight
On June 14 and 15, 1919, two British aviators, Captain John W. Alcock (pilot) and Lieutenant Arthur W. Brown (navigator), made the first nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. They flew together in a converted twin-engine Vickers Vimy bomber 44 feet long and with a wingspan of 68 feet. The 1,890-mile flight was made in 16 hours, 27 minutes from Newfoundland, Canada, to Clifden, Galway, Ireland. During the trip, the men ate meat sandwiches and chocolate and drank coffee. They both brought along toy cats as mascots.
Transistor Radio
On October 18, 1954, the first transistor radio, the Regency TR-1, was announced, and it hit the consumer market the following month. At 11 ounces and 3×5×1¼ inches in its plastic case, the Regency TR-1 was developed by the Regency Division of I.D.E.A. (Industrial Development Engineering Associates) of Indianapolis, Indiana, and patented by Dr. Heinz De Koster, a Dutch Ph.D. employee of the company. It retailed for $49.95; came in various colors, including black, ivory, mandarin red, cloud gray, mahogany, and olive green; and sold about 150,000 units. The Regency TR-1 featured 4 germanium transistors that operated on a 22.5-volt battery that lasted about 20 hours.
Traveler’s Check
In early January 1772, the London (England) Exchange Banking Company issued the first traveler’s checks for use in 90 European cities. These first traveler’s checks, conceived by Robert Harries, a banking official employed at the London Exchange Banking Company, replaced letters of credit, which were difficult to obtain. The circular notes with a value of $20 allowed travelers to exchange the traveler’s check for local currency. They were guaranteed replaceable if lost or stolen.
Triathlon
On Wednesday, September 25, 1974, the first triathlon was held at Mission Bay in San Diego, California, directed and conceived by Jack Johnstone and Don Shanahan. The San Diego Track Club sponsored the event consisting of 6 miles of running (the longest continuous stretch was 2.8 miles), 5 miles of bicycle riding (all at once), and 500 yards of swimming (the longest continuous stretch was 250 yards). Approximately 2 miles of the running was barefoot on grass and sand. Participants brought their own bicycles, and each of the 46 contenders paid a $1 entry fee. Bill Phillips finished first with a time of 55 minutes, 44 seconds. All 46 entrants finished the event.
Tunnel
The world’s first tunnel, the Middle Bronze Age Channel, dates to around 1800 B.C.E. and is located in Jerusalem, Israel. The tunnel was really a covered aqueduct in the ground that led from the Gihon Spring to the Pool of Siloam of ancient Jerusalem. This channel diverted the spring’s water supply from outside the city’s walls to the inside. It was a 20-foot-deep ditch that was covered over by large rock slabs after construction. The narrow tunnel was hidden by foliage that grew over and on it. Visitors can still walk most of its length.
Tuxedo
October 10, 1886, marked the first official appearance of the dinner jacket. It was at the Tuxedo Club’s Autumn Ball in Tuxedo Park, New York. Pierre Lorillard IV, heir to a tobacco fortune and the largest land-owner in town, introduced the first tuxedos from a variation of tailless red wool coats worn by English fox hunters. He had his tailor create four new formal tailless black jackets. Lorillard declined to wear the result, but his son Griswold and three of his friends wore them to the ball. The new style became known as “what they’re wearing to dinner in Tuxedo,” which earned those first four jackets the name “tuxedos.”
TV Critic
Gilbert Seldes became the first TV critic of note with a 1937 article, “Errors of Television,” published in the
Atlantic Monthly.
The distinguished writer and Harvard graduate was born in Alliance, New Jersey, and became well known for his 1924 book
The Seven Lively Arts,
a systematic critique of popular American culture. Seldes was the first to insist that popular culture, including TV, deserved serious attention from cultural critics.
TV Dinner
In 1949, Albert and Meyer Bernstein of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, marketed a line of frozen meals on three-part divided aluminum trays, but it was C.A. Swanson & Sons of Omaha, Nebraska, who first marketed and called its frozen meals TV dinners. The dinners cost 98¢ and consisted of turkey and cornbread dressing with gravy, sweet potatoes, and peas. Thanks to the aluminum tray the dinner came packaged in, you could just open the box and heat up the dinner in an oven. The convenience and ease of preparation made people who were not good cooks able to enjoy nearly any type of dinner they desired. The TV dinner was so popular in its first year that it sold more than 10 million units. Swanson transformed its meals into a cultural icon via a massive advertising campaign. The company stopped calling them TV dinners in 1962, and in 1986, Campbell Soup (owner of Swanson) replaced the aluminum trays with plastic microwavable ones.
BOOK: Firsts
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