On Friday, June 19, 1784, at about 3:00 in the afternoon, in the town of Bladensburg, Peter Carnes presented the first exhibition of the ascension of his Aerostatic Balloon. The Balloon that Carnes had constructed measured 35 feet in diameter and was estimated to have been 30 feet high. It was, “made of silk of various colours, with a cilindrical [sic] stove of iron suspended at the bottom, by which the internal air was rarified.” The Bladensburg exhibition was just five days before the grand feat occurred in Baltimore.