Lawrence Parsons, the 4th Lord Rosse, discovered NGC 3950 on 31 Mar 1872. While observing NGC 3949 = GC 2604 he noted a "companion nebula north about 2.5'." On 27 Apr 1875, Dreyer's micrometric measurement placed the nova in position angle 356.5° (north), distance 154.6". There is a very faint galaxy, PGC 37294, close north but the separation is only 1.6', so Dreyer's offset is 1' too far north. Despite the error, this galaxy was likely seen at Birr Castle. Karl Reinmuth identifies this galaxy as NGC 3950 in his 1926 photographic survey Die Herschel-Nebel.

The RNGC position is 4' north of NGC 3949. Dorothy Carlson misidentifies NGC 3950 as a star.

400/500mm - 17.5" (4/7/89): seen as an extremely faint mag 15.5-16.0 stellar object located 1.8' N of NGC 3949. The redshift-based light travel time is 1 billion years!

Notes by Steve Gottlieb