NGC/IC Project Restoration Effort

===== NGC 2908. WH's position, reduced by CH and given in her fair copy of the Sweeps, lands closer to a double star than it does to the faint spiral that is usually taken as H III 977. This has led me to wonder whether WH might actually have picked up the brighter double star rather than the fainter galaxy. However, Dreyer (in his Notes to WH's catalogues in the Scientific Papers) notes the offsets from another star in the sweep. These give a position closer to the galaxy than to the double star. Dreyer also notes that Bigourdan's observation accords better with the position derived from this second star (Bigourdan certainly saw the galaxy on the one night he measured it; on a poorer night a few years later, however, he was unable to see it). All these positions are in the big table, credited to WH and Bigourdan as appropriate. Given that the second star is closer to the galaxy than the first, we should probably give it greater weight than the first when deciding on a position derived from WH's observations. The position from that second star is just an arcminute north of the galaxy; the double star is several arcminutes to the northwest. Thus, I'm pretty sure that WH did in fact see the galaxy, faint as it is. His full description, by the way, reads "eF, vS. I also saw it with 300. iF." The "iF", omitted from the GC and NGC summary descriptions, may also be relevant. The faint galaxy has two fainter stars superposed on it which may have lent the impression of "irregularity."

===== NGC 2908 17.5" (4/6/02): faint, fairly small, round, 0.8' diameter, low but uneven surface brightness. A mag 10 star is 6' ENE. Located 35' NNW of a mag 6.1 star.