Pete Townsend of the Who did it in 1964.

(8?) September 1964 The Railway Tavern, Harrow and Wealdstone

1964 Rickenbacker Rose Morris 1998

His first public guitar smashing, where he cracked the headstock of his guitar on a low ceiling, pulling it out and realizing the damage, he smashed the remainder in disgust, then turned to pick up his Rick 12 and continued playing. The next gig at the Railway, the crowd expected him to smash a guitar again.

Pete: (After cracking the headstock) I was expecting everybody to go, “Wow, he’s broken his guitar, he’s broken his guitar,” but nobody did anything, which made me kind of angry in a way. And determined to get this precious event noticed by the audience. I proceeded to make a big thing of breaking the guitar. I bounced all over the stage with it and I threw the bits on the stage and I picked up my spare guitar and carried on as though I really had meant to do it.

--- famous performances ---

In the late 1960s, Townshend began playing Gibson SG models almost exclusively, specifically the Special models. He used this guitar at the Woodstock and Isle of Wight shows in 1969 and 1970, as well as the Live at Leeds performance in 1970.

-- as art --
At a concert in Germany, a police officer walked up to him, pointed his gun at him, and ordered Townshend to stop smashing the guitar. Townshend, always a voluble interview subject, would later relate these antics to German/British artist Gustav Metzger's theories on Auto-destructive art, to which he had been exposed at art school. Gustav Metzger (born 1926) is an artist and political activist who developed the concept of Auto-Destructive Art. Together with John Sharkey, he initiated the Destruction in Art Symposium in 1966. Metzger is recognized for his protests in the political and artistic realms. Around the same time, he was lecturing at Ealing Art College, where one of his students was rock musician Pete Townshend, who later cited Metzger's concepts as an influence for his famous guitar-smashing during performances of The Who. He has also influenced the self-eating computer virus works by the digital artist Joseph Nechvatal

-- Yoko Ono, Gustav Metzger and me…
Source(s):
http://www.thewho.net/whotabs/equipment/guitar/equip-smashed.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pete_Townshend
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_Metzger
http://stewarthomesociety.org/blog/?p=2141

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In 1964, while playing at London's Railway Station nightclub, Pete Townsend was having trouble with his Rickenbacker. The electric guitar was buzzing and humming, so Pete tried shaking it around, but accidentally hit the low ceiling. To his complete amazement, the guitar broke in half. Pete, thinking quickly, acted as though it was part of the act and started stomping on the guitar and completely destroyed it, and so guitar smashing was born.
Source(s):
http://www.igtc.com/pipermail/thewho/2004-June/000858.html

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Early years

A broken guitar.Jerry Lee Lewis may be the first rock artist to destroy his equipment on stage, with several, possibly erroneous, stories of him destroying and burning pianos in the 1950s.1

In the mid 1960s, guitarist Pete Townshend of The Who was the first guitar smashing rock artist. Rolling Stone magazine included his smashing of a Rickenbacker guitar at the Railway Hotel in September 196423 in their list of the "50 Moments That Changed the History of Rock & Roll".4 A student of Gustav Metzger, Townshend saw his guitar smashing as a kind of auto-destructive art.

Keith Moon, The Who's drummer, was also known for destroying his drum set. The most spectacular episode of this occurred during The Who's debut on U.S. television on the Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour in 1967. Moon overloaded his bass drum with explosive charges which were detonated during the finale of the song, "My Generation." The explosion caused guest Bette Davis to faint, set Pete Townshend's hair on fire and, according to legend, contributed to his later partial deafness and tinnitus. Moon was also injured in the explosion when shrapnel from the cymbals cut his arm.5 VH1 later placed this event in the top ten of their list of the 100 Greatest Rock and Roll Moments on Television.6

Jeff Beck, then a member of the Yardbirds, reluctantly destroyed a guitar in the 1966 film Blowup after being told to emulate The Who by director Michelangelo Antonioni.7 Jimi Hendrix is also famous for burning two guitars at three shows, most notably the Monterey Pop Festival.8

edit Later instrument destruction
Ritchie Blackmore of Deep Purple and Rainbow smashed guitars in performance through the seventies.9

Paul Simonon of The Clash famously destroyed his bass on stage, with a photograph of the event becoming the iconic cover to their London Calling album.10

Kurt Cobain and members of Nirvana smashed guitars and other equipment at performances throughout the band's career.1112

Win Butler of Arcade Fire destroyed an acoustic guitar at the end of a live performance on Saturday Night Live, after a string had broken during the performance13

Matt Bellamy, singer and guitarist of British rock band Muse, has smashed various Ibanez, Gretsch and Gibson models of electrics throughout the band's career. He recentlywhen? smashed two of his famous custom Hugh Manson guitars, before repairing one. The other was beyond repair after being thrown by Bellamy at a strobe light, and the pieces now reside at Manson's Devon workshop. 14

In one Switchfoot Podcast, Jon Foreman (Of Switchfoot) was shown "saying goodbye" to his resonator guitar. After that, he was shown smashing it in concert and then using it as a drum stick against a cymbal.
Source(s):
wikipedia

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http://www.igtc.com/pipermail/thewho/2004-June/000858.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrument_destruction

Peter Townsend
September 1964
London's Railway Station Nightclub
Electric Rickenbacker

I have too much respect for the equipment so I don't have a favorite video. I guess I am in the Carlos Santana camp.
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