Official Site of The State of New Jersey
Famous Firsts in New Jersey
- The first organized baseball game was played in Hoboken in 1846.
- The first boardwalk in the world was built in 1870 at Atlantic City.
- The first copper mine in America was opened by enterprising Dutch settlers in the Kittatinny Mountains, circa 1640.
- The first drive-in movie theater was built on a 10-acre plot in Camden County in 1933.
- The first ferry service in the U.S. operated between Hoboken and Manhattan in 1811.
- The first seashore resorts opened in Cape May and Long Branch in the early 1800s.
- The first Miss America was chosen in Atlantic City in 1921.
- The first movie was developed by Thomas A. Edison in West Orange in 1889.
- The first brewery in America opened in Hoboken in 1642.
- The first phonograph was made by Thomas A. Edison in Menlo Park in 1877.
- The first balloon flight in America was made by Jean-Pierre Blanchard. On January 9,1793, he landed a balloon at Deptford carrying a letter from George Washington.
- The first professional basketball game was played in Trenton in 1896.
- The first incandescent lamp (light bulb) was made by Thomas A. Edison in Menlo Park in 1879.
- The first submarine was built in 1878 by John Holland of Passaic County. The submarine is now in a public museum in Paterson.
- The first condensed soup in America was cooked and canned in Camden County in 1897.
- The first robot to replace a human worker was used by General Motors in Ewing Township in 1961.
- The first saltwater taffy was produced at the Jersey shore in the 1870s.
- The first solid body electric guitar was invented by Les Paul of Mahwah in 1940.
- The first national historic park in America was established in 1933 in Morristown.
- The first cultivated blueberries were marketed by Elizabeth White of Whitesbog in 1916.
- The first steam locomotive to actually pull a train on a track was built by John Stevens of Hoboken in 1824.
- The first town to be lighted by electricity was Roselle in 1883.
- The first radio broadcast of the World Series was transmitted live on radio station WIZ in Newark in 1921.
- The first intercollegiate football game was played by Rutgers and Princeton in New Brunswick on November 6, 1869. Rutgers won 6 to 4.
- The first airplane passenger flight flew from New York to Atlantic City on May 3, 1919.