Andrew Cooper
Apr 17, 2010    Hale Pohaku, HI (map)
46cm f/4.5 Newtonian, Deep Violet @ 175x
Seeing: 7 Transparency: 7 Moon: 0%

Big! Bright, a bright round disk surrounding a bright stellar core, some detail visible in the halo as darker areas, but no clear spiral structure, flanked by two dim galaxies, NGC4303A is 10' northeast, NGC4292 is 12' northwest

Andrew Cooper
Mar 22, 2003    TIMPA, Avra Valley, AZ (map)
46cm f/4.5 Deep Violet

Very nice face-on spiral galaxy, large, reasonably bright, almost stellar and distinct core with a spread of arms surrounding, cannot completely resolve the arms, but some brighter clumps clearly outline sections

Rev. T.W. Webb
May 19, 1885    Hardwick, Herefordshire, England (map)

Faint; bright centre, E. of Rosse, spiral.

― Celestial Objects for Common Telescopes, T. W. Webb, 1917

Charles Messier
May 11, 1779    

Nebula, very faint & difficult to perceive. M. Messier mistook this nebula for the Comet of 1779, on the 5th, 6th & 11th of May; on the 11th he recognized that this was not the Comet, but a nebula which was located on its path & in the same point of the sky.

― Connaissance des Temps, 1781

Drawings, descriptions, and CCD photos are copyright Andrew Cooper unless otherwise noted, no usage without permission.

A complete list of credits and sources can be found on the about page