There have been many significant events and achievements that happened first in America or was done first by Americans. For example, the first selfie was taken by Robert Cornelius in 1839. The first toilet paper was invented by Joseph Gayetty in 1857, and the first skyscraper ever built was in the city of Chicago in 1885, the Home Insurance Building, which stood at 138 feet, designed by William Le Baron Jenney. There are many more "firsts" in America's history, and each state actually has an entry of their own.
Some of these firsts are quite historic such as that in Iowa, which was the first state to desegregate schools in 1867. The story goes that Susan Clark had been prohibited by Muscatine's Second Ward Common School because of her skin color. So, her father sued the school, and the Iowa Supreme Court ruled in their favor. Maryland can be proud to say that they had the world's first airport. The College Park Airport was originally built so that the Wright brothers could train a few military officers on how to fly their plane. That led to a whole slew of other firsts brought about by the new technology.
There are some very fun firsts as well such as the world's first German chocolate cake in Texas, when The Dallas Morning News published the recipe in June 1957. Tennessee boasts the world's first cotton candy when William Morrison and John Wharton developed the cotton candy machine in 1897 and debuted it at the St. Louis World's Fair in 1904 as "fairy floss". To see all the other states' firsts, check out the Saturday Evening Post's two-parter here and here.
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