It was on October 17, 1829 that a 22 year old from Rhode Island, Sam Patch, jumped off a platform built atop a 30 metre (98 foot) ladder built on Goat Island in Niagara Falls New York into the Niagara River. He was successful and lived to tell about his great accomplishment.

However, repeating the stunt at Rochester New York when he jumped into the Genesee River in November of the same year he was unsuccessful and he lost his life.

There would be no more daredevil stunts until 72 years later when Annie Taylor went over Niagara Falls in a wooden barrel on October 24, 1901 and lived.

Attached is a poster advertising his fatal 1829 jump into the Genesee River in Rochester N.Y.