Remembering the air force of the Civil War

Enough about the Navy SEALs. This weekend, the Smithsonian will commemorate America’s first attempt at an air force.

In June 150 years ago, Thaddeus Lowe flew 500 feet into the air in front of President Abraham Lincoln. Lowe was an American “aeronaut,” and he took flight in a 19,000-cubic-foot balloon.

Lowe had stumbled on the idea of using lighter-than-air aircraft for war reconnaissance two months before, when his balloon had floated into South Carolina air space and came down in hostile territory. This inflatable flying machine, Lowe suggested to Lincoln, could be used by the Union Army to spy on Confederates during the Civil War.

The 150th anniversary of the idea of a Union Balloon Corps — the first air force in the United States — is being honored Saturday on the Mall, outside the National Air and Space Museum, the very ground from which Lowe’s flight took place. A near-replica of Lowe’s original will be displayed....