Harold Corwin

NGC 7776 = IC 1514 is another of Ormond Stone's discoveries at Leander McCormick. Though his nominal position is quite poor (1.5 minutes of time off in RA and nearly 12 arcmin in Dec), he has left us a sketch showing the nebula and two nearby stars. The brighter of the stars is just outside of the nominal field diameter, but is nevertheless found on the sky where Stone placed it on the sketch.

This clearly identifies his nebula as the same one that Johann Palisa found and measured accurately seven years later in September of 1893. Even though Palisa did not have a precise position for his comparison star, the position he published is quite accurate. So, there is no doubt about the identity of the galaxy he measured.

Clinching the identity, Palisa noted an eccentric nucleus, and Stone's sketch shows that same offset nucleus.

See NGC 7761 = IC 5361 for another Stone discovery that depends on this galaxy for its identification.

― NGC Notes by Harold Corwin

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

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