Lewis Swift discovered IC 2068 = Sw. XI-71 on 9 or 10 Dec 1895 and recorded "eF; pL; R; 3 st like belt of Orion point to it; p of 2 [with NGC 1585]." His position is 5.4' too far northeast, but there are no other nearby candidates and the description fits (the stars are south-southeast). Slightly different dates are given in his first Lowe Observatory list and his large AN table.

400/500mm - 18" (12/30/08): this galaxy was picked up first while I was sweeping the NGC 1585. At 175x it appeared faint, small, elongated NNW-SSE, 0.5'x0.3', quasi-stellar nucleus. It's surprising that John Herschel missed this galaxy as it's only 11' NW of NGC 1585 and only slightly smaller and fainter. A mag 10 star lies 7.8' SE and along with two stars 1.8' and 3.9' NNW, this trio leads NW to this IC galaxy.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb