Hi Visvanath,
The first proposal was in 1982:
<19-Sep-82 11:44 Scott E Fahlman
From: Scott E Fahlman <Fahlman at Cmu-20c>
I propose that the following character sequence for joke markers:
Read it sideways. Actually, it is probably more economical to mark
things that are NOT jokes - given current trends. For this, use
However, this seems to go a bit further in time:
The National Telegraphic Review and Operators Guide in April 1857 documented the use of the number 73 in Morse code (--··· ···--) to express "love and kisses"
http://www.neatorama.com/2009/05/05/10-things-you-didnt-know-about-emoticons/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emoticon#Antecedents
--· -- ·- -·· ···