Lewis Swift discovered NGC 3011 = Sw. III-47 on 21 Apr 1886 with the 16" refractor at Warner Observatory and remarked "eeF; eS; stel; a row of 8 or 10 pB stars nr preceding." His position is 9 sec of RA west and 1' south of UGC 5259 and the row of stars is just as he described (north-south).

400/500mm - 17.5" (4/15/99): faint, fairly small, round, weak concentration, 0.8' diameter. Located 2.5' WSW of a mag 10 star. A nice 10' string of 8 mag 10-12 stars oriented N-S is just a few arcminutes preceding. Picked up at 100x and observation at 220x. Member of the USGC U268 group (z ~.005) with brightest member NGC 3003 1.2° N.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb