Harold Corwin

NGC 1213 = IC 1881. Swift found NGC 1213 in October of 1884, soon after he began observing with the 16-inch refractor at Warner Observatory in Rochester, New York. As was to be his practice for the next 14-15 years, he "measured" the position of his "nova" by centering it in the eyepiece of his telescope, then reading the setting circles. This led to many mistakes in his positions.

Swift's RA of this object is far enough off that Bigourdan thought it was probably also a "nova" when he rediscovered it in January of 1891 (the object that Bigourdan labels "NGC 1213" is a star). Though Bigourdan's observations of the galaxy are especially poor because of its low surface brightness, it is almost certainly the same object that Swift saw. Both of their descriptions are apt (including Swift's "F * close n"), and Bigourdan suggests in his that the galaxy might be NGC 1213.

― NGC Notes by Harold Corwin

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