The 2008 presidential election is this country's 56th consecutive general election, and it is notable for a number of firsts.

It’s the first time a major party has nominated an African American for president. But Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee, is not the first black American to be nominated for president. That distinction goes to the Rev. Clennon King, who ran as the candidate of the Independent Afro-American Party in 1960. Since then, Shirley Chisholm (1972), Jesse Jackson (1984 and 1988), Alan Keyes (1996 and 2000), Carol Mosley Brown and Al Sharpton (both in 2004) have unsuccessfully sought their parties' presidential nominations.

This is the first election in which both major party candidates were born outside the continental United States. Obama was born in Hawaii, and Republican nominee John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone.

Both candidates are serving members of the U.S. Senate, and that is also a first. Regardless of who wins, it will be the first time a sitting senator has been elected since John F. Kennedy in 1960. Warren G. Harding was the only other president to win office while serving as senator. Obama's running mate, Joseph Biden, is also a sitting senator.

The 2008 election marks the first time since 1928 that neither an incumbent president nor an incumbent vice president ran for their party's nomination in the presidential election. President George W. Bush is termed out and barred from running for a third term by the 22nd Amendment to the Constitution. Vice President Dick Cheney has stated repeatedly since 2001 that he would never run for president.

If the Obama-Biden ticket wins, it will be the first time an African American is president and a Catholic (Biden) is vice president. If the McCain-Palin ticket wins, McCain will become the country's oldest president (72), and Sarah Palin will become the first female vice president.

Even before she was nominated, Palin already had several firsts to her credit. She is Alaska's first female governor and its youngest. She is the first woman to run on a Republican presidential ticket and the first Alaskan nominee of either major party.

If McCain is elected, he will be the first president from Arizona. Barry Goldwater was the Republican nominee in 1964, but he was defeated by Lyndon Johnson. McCain would also become the second divorced president. He divorced his first wife, Carol Shepp, in 1980 and remarried a month later to Cindy Hensley. The first divorced candidate to win the presidency was Ronald Reagan, who married Nancy Reagan after his divorce from Jane Wyman.

The 2008 election also marks a generational milestone in presidential politics. It is the first election in which a major party candidate was born after 1960. Obama, who is 47, was born in 1961. While he wouldn't become the youngest elected president (that was John F. Kennedy, who was 43 when he elected in 1960), the age difference between Obama and McCain is nearly 25 years. That is the greatest age disparity between presidential candidates ever, surpassing the 23-year difference between Bill Clinton and Bob Dole in the 1996 election.