The first human arrow was Tony Zedoras, billed as `Alar’, at the Barnum &  Bailey Circus in the USA in 1896.

The earliest patent relating to air-cushioned craft was applied for in 1877 by Sir John I. Thornycroft (1843–1928) of London, and the idea was developed by Toivo Kaario of Finland in 1935.

The first public flight by a full-sized hovercraft was made by the 4-tonne (8,800 lb) Saunders-Roe SR.N1 at Cowes, Isle of Wight on 11 June 1959. With a 680 kg (1500 lb) thrust Viper turbojet engine, this craft reached 68 knots (126 km/h or 78 mph) in June 1961. The hovercraft was the brainchild of Sir Christopher Cockerell (UK).

The first human cannonball was `Zazel’  in 1877, when she was shot a distance of about 6.1 m (30 ft) at Westminster Aquarium, London, UK.

There are more than 950,000 Christian hymns in existence. The music and parts of the text of a hymn in the Oxyrhynchus Papyri from the 2nd century are the earliest known hymnody. The earliest exactly datable hymn is the Heyr Himna Smi¢ur (Hear, the Maker of Heaven) from 1208 by the Icelandic bard and chieftain Kolbeinn Tumason (1173-1208).

In March 2007, Prof. Esmail Zanjani from the University of Nevada (USA) announced that he and his research team had created the world´s first human-sheep chimaera, i.e. a sheep that contains sheep cells and human cells. 85 per cent of its cells are sheep, the remaining 15 per cent are human, and its creation brings ever closer to reality the prospect of animal organs being transplanted into humans. Zanjani and his team have spent seven years and £5 million perfecting the technique required to produce Continue reading →

A common-used statement about snow is that two snowflakes are never alike. However, in 1988 Nancy Knight (USA), a scientist at the National Center for Atmosphere Research in Boulder, Colorado, USA, found two identical examples while studying snow crystals from a storm in Wisconsin, using a microscope.

On 4 July 2005 a 350-kg copper ‘bullet’, release from NASA’s Deep Impact spacecraft, slammed into the surface of comet Tempel 1 at a velocity of 10.3 km/s. The impact, which was the equivalent of 4.7 tonnes of TNT, created an enormous ejecta plume and a crater on the comet around 100 m wide and 30 m deep.

The first successful petrol-driven car, the Motorwagen, built by Karl Friedrich Benz (1844-1929) of Karlsruhe, Germany, ran at Mannheim, Germany, in late 1885. The three-wheeler weighed 254 kg (560 lb) and could reach a speed of 13-16 km/h (8-10 mph). Its single-cylinder engine (bore 91.4 mm; 3.6 in, stroke 160 mm; 6.3 in) delivered 0.63 kW (0.85 hp) at 400 rpm. It was patented on 29 January 1886. Its first 1-km (0.6-mile) road test was reported in the local newspaper, the Neue Badische Landeszeitung, on Continue reading →

Released on 13 June 2006 in North America, Metal Gear Solid: Digital Graphic Novel is the first interactive comic for the PSP. Made by Kojima Productions, the graphic novel features character backstories, Manga-style art and original music. GWR Video Gamer’s Edition 2008, title: First interactive digital graphic novel for the PSP.