Have you ever wondered what George Washington, the first President of America and Oprah Winfrey, the first African-American woman to own her own television production company have in common? They both were the famous firsts in American history. Read the following Historyplex article to know some more famous firsts.
| ❝There are 86400 seconds in a day. 86400 moments to create firsts.❞
― David Cuschieri
|
Time and history have borne witness to remarkable incidences, and the most amazing people who have not only stepped out of the ordinary, but have opened doors and paved way for many more who dared to follow them. You can even say that these brave individuals set a new trend.
Some of these people have shown immense courage and attempted to do something that not only got them fame and success but also inspired the future generations of this country.
These extraordinary people dared to step out of the ordinary and become a first. And this Historyplex post lists out some famous firsts in American history.
Important Firsts in American History
Virginia Dare
Year: 1587
First child born in the American colonies
Anne Bradstreet
Year: 1650
First published American woman writer
Ann Smith Franklin
Year: 1762
First woman newspaper editor
John Jay
Year: 1789
First Chief Justice of the United States
Frederick Muhlenberg
Year: 1789
First Speaker of the House of Representatives
Edmund Randolph
Year: 1789
First Attorney General.
George Washington
Year: 1789
First and only President to be elected with a unanimous vote
Martha Washington
Year: 1789
First Lady
Benjamin Stoddert
Year: 1798
First Secretary of the Navy
Thomas Jefferson
Year: 1801
First President to be inaugurated in Washington D.C.
Mary Lyon
Year: 1837
Founded the first women’s college in the U.S.
William Henry Harrison
Year: 1841
First President to die in office.
Elizabeth Blackwell
Year: 1849
First woman to receive medical degree in U.S.
Antoinette Brown Blackwell
Year: 1853
First American woman ordained a minister
William Carney
Year: 1863
First African-American to receive the Congressional Medal of Honor
Mary Walker
Year: 1865
First and only woman to receive the Medal of Honor
David Glasgow Farragut
Year: 1866
First admiral, rear admiral, and vice admiral in the U.S. Navy
Lucy Hobbs Taylor
Year: 1867
First woman to become a certified dentist
Ebenezer D. Bassett
Year: 1869
First African-American diplomat
Arabella Mansfield
Year: 1869
First woman lawyer
Jefferson Long
Year: 1870
First African-American elected to U.S. House of Representatives
Hiram Revels
Year: 1870
First African-American Senator
Victoria Woodhull
Year: 1872
First woman to run for President of the U.S.
Herbert Hoover
Year: 1874
First President to be born on U.S. soil
Belva Ann Bennett Lockwood
Year: 1879
First female lawyer to plead a case before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Mary Mahoney
Year: 1879
First African-American female nurse
Moses Fleetwood Walker
Year: 1884
First African-American major league baseball player
Susanna M. Salter
Year: 1887
First woman elected as mayor
Louise Blanchard Bethune
Year: 1890
First American woman architect
Louis Henry Sullivan
Year: 1891
First American architect to build a skyscraper
Myra Bradwell
Year: 1892
First female lawyer in the U.S.
May Sutton Brandy
Year: 1904
First American woman to win at Wimbledon
Alice Wells
Year: 1910
First policewoman in the U.S.
Harriet Quimby
Year: 1911
First woman to fly across the English Channel
Louis D. Brandeis
Year: 1916
First Jewish member of the U.S. Supreme Court
Jeannette Rankin
Year: 1916
First woman elected to U.S. Congress
Lucy Slowe
Year: 1920
First African-American woman to win a major sports title in the U.S.
Bessie Coleman
Year: 1921
First African-American female pilot.
Margaret Gorman
Year: 1921
First Miss America.
Clifton Reginald Wharton, Sr.
Year: 1924
First African-American diplomat to become an ambassador
Gertrude Ederle
Year: 1926
First American woman to swim the English Channel.
Al Jolson
Year: 1927
First to star in the first talking picture, The Jazz Singer
Janet Gaynor
Year: 1928
First winner of the Academy Award for Best Actress.
Ellen Church
Year: 1930
First female flight attendant.
Sinclair Lewis
Year: 1930
First American recipient of the Nobel Prize for Literature
Jane Addams
Year: 1931
First American woman to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize
Hattie Caraway
Year: 1932
First woman United States Senator
Amelia Earhart
Year: 1932
First woman to fly transatlantic solo
Frances Perkins
Year: 1933
First woman to be included in the U.S. Presidential Cabinet.
Lettie Pate Whitehead
Year: 1934
First American woman to be on Coca-Cola’s board of directors.
Wallis Warfield Simpson
Year: 1936
Was the first Woman of the Year in the Time magazine.
Hattie McDaniel
Year: 1940
First African-American to win an Academy Award, and to be honored with a U.S. postage stamp
Gwendolyn Brooks
Year: 1949
First African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize
Florence Chadwick
Year: 1951
First woman to have swum across the English Channel in each direction.
Jacqueline Cochrane
Year: 1953
First woman to have flown a bomber across the Atlantic
Tenley Albright
Year: 1953
First American female skater to win an Winter Olympics gold medal
Marian Anderson
Year: 1955
First African-American to perform at the Metropolitan Opera
Althea Gibson
Year: 1957
First African-American to win a Wimbledon singles title
William O’Ree
Year: 1958
First African-American hockey player in the NHL
Ruth Carol Taylor
Year: 1958
First African-American woman to become a flight attendant
Clifton R Wharton, Jr.
Year: 1958
First African-American US foreign minister
Hiram L. Fong
Year: 1959
First Chinese-American in the U.S. Senate
Daniel K. Inouye
Year: 1959
First Japanese-American in the U.S. House of Representatives
Harry Belafonte
Year: 1960
First African-American performer to win an Emmy Award
Roy Claxton Acuff
Year: 1962
First living inductee into the Country Music Hall of Fame
John Glenn
Year: 1962
First U.S. astronaut to orbit the Earth
Jerrie Mock
Year: 1964
First woman to fly solo around the world
Sidney Poitier
Year: 1964
First African-American to win an Academy Award for Best Actor
Patricia R Harris
Year: 1965
First African-American woman to serve in the U.S. Cabinet
Robert C. Weaver
Year: 1966
First African-American to hold a cabinet-level position in the U.S.
Thurgood Marshall
Year: 1967
First African-American to become a Supreme Court judge
Muriel Siebert
Year: 1967
First woman to own a seat on the New York Stock Exchange
Carl Stokes
Year: 1967
First African-American to be elected mayor of a major city
Shirley Chisholm
Year: 1968
First African-American woman elected to the House of Representatives
Neil Armstrong
Year: 1969
First man to walk on the moon
Elizabeth P. Hoisington
Year: 1970
First female brigadier general in the armed forces
Bella Savitsky Abzug
Year: 1971
First Jewish woman in Congress
Bernice Gera
Year: 1972
First female umpire in professional baseball
Jean Westwood
Year: 1972
First female chair of the Democratic National Committee
Richard Milhous Nixon
Year: 1974
First and the only U.S. President to resign from office
George Carlin
Year: 1975
First host of Saturday Night Live
Ella Grasso
Year: 1975
First woman governor
Sarah Caldwell
Year: 1976
First female conductor at the Metropolitan Opera
Bette Davis
Year: 1977
First woman to receive a Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute
Janet Guthrie
Year: 1977
First woman to qualify and race at the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500
Harvey Milk
Year: 1977
First acknowledged homosexual elected to high local office
Sandra Day O’Connor
Year: 1981
First woman to be appointed to the Supreme Court
Guion Stewart Bluford, Jr.
Year: 1983
First African-American in space
Elizabeth Dole
Year: 1983
First female U.S. Secretary of a branch of the U.S. Military
Sally Kristen Ride
Year: 1983
First woman in space
Vanessa Williams
Year: 1983
First African-American Miss America
Joan Benoit
Year: 1984
First women’s Olympic marathon champion
Geraldine Ferraro
Year: 1984
First female Vice Presidential candidate
Kathryn Sullivan
Year: 1984
First American woman to walk in space
Penny Harrington
Year: 1985
First woman police chief of a major city
Oprah Winfrey
Year: 1986
First African-American woman to own her own television production company
Aretha Franklin
Year: 1987
First woman to be inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame
Gertrude Belle Elion
Year: 1988
First woman to be inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame.
Penny Marshall
Year: 1988
First woman film director whose film earned more than USD 100 million at the box office
Antonia Novello
Year: 1990
First woman to be named Surgeon General of the U.S.
Mae Carol Jemison
Year: 1992
First African-American woman in space
Maya Angelou
Year: 1993
First female poet to read a poem at the Presidential inauguration
Carol Elizabeth Moseley-Braun
Year: 1993
First African-American U.S. Senator for the Democratic Party
Janet Reno
Year: 1993
First woman to serve as Attorney General.
Sheila Widnall
Year: 1993
First female Secretary of the Air Force.
Madeleine Albright
Year: 1996
First woman Secretary of State of the United States
Claudia Kennedy
Year: 1997
First female US Army three-star general
Jane Henney
Year: 1998
First woman appointed Commissioner of the USFDA
Eileen Collins
Year: 1999
First woman astronaut to command a space shuttle mission
Hillary Rodham Clinton
Year: 2000
First former first-lady ever elected to national office
Colin Powell
Year: 2000
First African-American Secretary of State
Halle Berry
Year: 2002
First African-American woman to win an Oscar for Best Actress
Vonetta Flowers
Year: 2002
First African-American woman to win a gold at the Winter Olympics
Gene Robinson
Year: 2003
First and openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church in U.S.
Condoleezza Rice
Year: 2005
First female African-American Secretary of State.
Tony Dungy
Year: 2007
First African-American coach to win the Super Bowl
Keith Ellison
Year: 2007
First Muslim member of the U.S. Congress
Drew Gilpin Faust
Year: 2007
First woman president of Harvard University
Ann Dunwoody
Year: 2008
First woman four-star general in the United States military.
Sarah Palin
Year: 2008
First Republican woman to be nominated for Vice President
Barack Hussein Obama Jr.
Year: 2009
First African-American U.S. President
Michelle Obama
Year: 2009
First African-American U.S. First Lady
These phenomenal people have shown us that if you have a clear wish and some courage in your heart, there is nothing that can hold you back from being the next archetype at whatever you are good at.
