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Archive: June 2025 (2 Posts)

Published engraved image showing a crowd observing the balloon "Intrepid," leaving the ground in the distance.

Nothing Happens in Washington without a Purchase Order: William J. Rhees and Thaddeus Lowe’s Balloons, 1861.

Posted by: Michelle Krowl

In summer 1861, William J. Rhees, chief clerk of the Smithsonian Institution, wrote to his wife about Professor Thaddeus Lowe’s balloon experiments on the National Mall . . . including the reason one ascent never got off the ground. Because (almost) nothing in Washington happens without first securing a purchase order or an appropriation.