The gates itself were likely discovered by Hyuugas who can see the chakra network, but first person to actually utilize the gates is a mystery. Tobirama seems like a likely candidate since he is a perfectionist, but it requires a person to actually focus on hard work and great amounts of body conditioning and taijutsu training to bring it out and tobirama is actually a bit of an all rounder in that respect with great skill in all areas, but not specializing specifically in taijutsu. I would say that it was very likely a senju who first used it as they are focused on the body and training, but tonbirama just doesn't sit right with me as the person who first used it.
For all we know the first people to use it could have only used it unintentionally as a natural defensive reflex against danger like kakashi did when scaling the cliff one handed and realized that they could try training to use that power for themselves as a tool to aid them in combat against particularly powerful foes.