George Johnstone Stoney, Lord Rosse's assistant, discovered NGC 5609 on 1 Mar 1851. During an observation of NGC 5614 he noted " NGC 5614] is double [with NGC 5615], two others [NGC 5609 and 5613] faint." A diagram shows NGC 5609 5' WSW of NGC 5614 (the actual separation is 4'). On 6 May 1877 Dreyer made another observation, noting "another preceding, eeF, v, Position from GC 3880, ~259°, Dist ~240"."

400/500mm - 18" (5/16/09): extremely faint and small, round, 6" diameter. Required averted vision to glimpse ~20% of the time at 280x, though could consistently repeat the observation. Visible over 1/2 the time in a 22" at 330x. Located 4' WSW of NGC 5614.

600/800mm - 24" (7/8/13): at 280x, fairly faint, fairly small, round, low even surface brightness, 18" diameter. Visible continuously with averted. Located 4' WSW of NGC 5614 (Arp 178) in a quartet.

900/1200mm - 48" (4/15/10): at 431x easily visible with direct vision as a moderately bright, fairly small, round glow of ~20" diameter, with a moderately high surface brightness. Located 4' WSW of NGC 5614 and 4.7' SW of slightly brighter NGC 5613. The redshift-based (z = .10) light-travel time is 1.3 billion years, possibly the most distant object in the NGC!

Notes by Steve Gottlieb