John Herschel discovered NGC 2088 = h2955 on 9 Feb 1836 and recorded "eF; S; R; insulated." His mean position (2 sweeps) of 05 40 56.4 -68 27 54 (2000) was used by Dreyer in the NGC. The declination given in RNGC, NGC 2000 and UGC 2000 (first edition) is exactly 1 degree too far south. This error originated in Shapley and Lindsay's "A Catalogue of Clusters in the Large Magellanic Cloud", Irish Astronomical Journal, v. 6, pp. 74-91, 1963. The declination should have been -68° 29' instead of -69° 29'. The error was noted by Hodge and Wright in their LMC Atlas. The ESO and Kontizas position is correct.

600/800mm - 30" (10/14/15 - OzSky): at 394x; bright, fairly small, irregular, ~35" diameter. Includes a bright quasi-stellar knot of stars near the center along with an individual star close east and a couple of mag 15-16 stars around the edges. A neat 6' curving stream of stars begins at a mag 11 star 4.5' north and arcs southeast. NGC 2088 is the first in a group of cluster with NGC 2096 7' E, NGC 2094 8.6' NE, NGC 2098 14' NE and NGC 2109 19' ESE.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb