8th
1854
….. U.K ..... the vicar of Brook in Norfolk held the FIRST Harvest Festival service. Dr William Beal disapproved of the traditional ceremony of the feasts in public houses and instead organised a church service which was so packed that parishioners were turned away. Afterwards 300 farmers, labourers and families joined him on the vicarage lawn for a feast, where they were serenaded by a band. The event was reported in The Times and led to churches throughout the country holding similar events1888 ..... U.K ..... Accrington, Villa, Blackburn, Bolton, Burnley, Derby, Everton, Notts C, Preston, Stoke, West Brom and Wolves played the FIRST English Football league matches
1903
..... U.S.A ..... the FIRST Western film was Kit Carson which was filmed on location in the Adirondack Mountains of New York State. It was directed by Wallace McCutcheon for the American Mutoscope and Biograph Co1910
..... the world’s FIRST air collision occurred over Austria when 2 rival pioneer aviators, who were brothers, crashed after arguing about who should hand-crank the other’s engine1914
..... U.K ..... the FIRST tank, designed by William Tritton, was tested at Lincoln ..... and ..... FRANCE ..... Thomas James Highgate became the FIRST soldier to be executed in the First World War for desertion in France. He was pardoned in 2006 along with all the other soldiers who were executed for their so-called cowardice1944
..... GERMANY ..... the FIRST of the V2 rockets were sent against Britain by Germany. V2 is short for Vergultungswaffe. It was Hitler’s ultimate terror weapon and between this day and May 1945 around 3,000 rockets, each travelling three times faster than sound and carrying nearly a ton of high explosive over a range of 200 miles, killed over 3000 people in England and Belgium. They were developed by the German scientist Wernher Von Braun and were seen as a more serious threat than the V1s as there was no defence against them apart from bombing the launching sites. After the was Von Braun went to America where he helped to develop the American space programme1966
..... U.S.A ..... the FIRST episode of Star Trek was shown on American television. It ended 79 episodes later in June 1969 when NBC cancelled its contract. The came 22 Trek animations in 1973 and 1974 with William Shatner and Co doing the voice-overs. However Star Trek is still ‘boldly going’ in 1997 with movies, the Next Generation series and Deep Space 9 about a frontier space station
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