New Hampshire - New Hampshire Firsts

New Hampshire Firsts

• On January 5, 1776 at Exeter, the Provincial Congress of New Hampshire ratified the first independent constitution in the Americas, free of British rule.
• On June 12, 1800, Fernald's Island in the Piscataqua River became the first government-sanctioned US Navy shipyard.
• Started in 1822, Dublin's Juvenile Library was the first free public library.
• In 1828, the first women's strike in the nation took place at Dover's Cocheco Mills.
• Founded in 1833, the Peterborough Town Library was the first public library, supported with public funds, in the world.
• On August 3, 1852, New Hampshire was the site of the first intercollegiate athletic event. Harvard defeated Yale in a 2-mile (3.2 km) rowing race on Lake Winnipesaukee, the first meeting in a rivalry that continues to this day.
• Finished on June 27, 1874, the first trans-Atlantic telecommunications cable between Europe and America stretched from Balinskelligs Bay, Ireland, to Rye Beach.
• On February 6, 1901, a group of nine conservationists founded the Society for the Protection of New Hampshire Forests, the first forest-conservation advocacy group in the US.
• In 1908, Monsignor Pierre Hevey organized the nation's first credit union, in Manchester, to help mill workers save and borrow money.
• In 1933 the League of New Hampshire Craftsmen held the first crafts fair in the nation.
• In July 1944, the Bretton Woods Agreement, the first fully negotiated system intended to govern monetary relations among independent nation-states, was signed at the Mount Washington Hotel.
• On May 5, 1961, Alan Shepard of Derry rode a Mercury spacecraft and became the first American in space.
• In 1963, New Hampshire's legislature approved the nation's first modern state lottery, which began play in 1964.
• In 1966, Ralph Baer of Sanders Associates, Inc., Nashua, recruited engineers to develop the first home video game.
• Christa McAuliffe of Concord became the first private citizen selected to venture into space. She perished with her six space shuttle Challenger crewmates on January 28, 1986.
• On May 17, 1996 New Hampshire became the first state in the country to install a green LED traffic light. New Hampshire was selected because it was the first state to install the red and yellow variety statewide.
• On May 31, 2007, New Hampshire became "...the first state to recognize same-sex unions without a court order or the threat of one."