William Herschel discovered NGC 5005 = H I-96 = h1547 on 1 May 1785 (sweep 405) and recorded "vB, mE nearly in the parallel. The faint rays included, about 5' long; the vB part of it, about 1.5' long; the brightness decreasing very suddenly." JH made two observations, described on sweep 73 "vB; vL; mE; 4' l, 1' br; vsbM to a nucleus, pos by diagram = 30° nf to sp." A dark lane north of the nucleus was suspected during several observations at Birr Castle. On 4 May 1861: "Nucleus elongated and perhaps not in direction of major axis of nebula. Dark lane suspected north and perhaps on the other side also, coming slightly preceding nucleus?"

300/350mm - 13.1" (4/12/86): very bright, elongated WSW-ENE, bright core with a stellar nucleus.

400/500mm - 17.5" very bright, large, elongated 5:2 WSW-ENE, 4.8'x2.0'. Strong concentration with a small very bright elongated core and stellar nucleus. NGC 5002 lies 26' SSW and NGC 5033 (the brightest in the group and a physical companion) is 40' SE.

600/800mm - 24" (5/27/17): extremely bright edge-on 3:1 WSW-ENE, nearly 5'x1.8' with averted. Sharply concentrated with a very bright thin, elongated core punctuated by a sharp stellar nucleus. A thin dust lane is evident hugging the north side of the core (creating a sharp light cut-off) and is more easily seen on the west side. Spiral structure can be picked out on both ends of the outer halo. On the WSW end, a broad outer portion of a spiral arm sweeps south (clockwise) and on the ENE end another ill-defined arm curls north.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb