William Herschel discovered NGC 6355 = H I-46 = h3681 on 24 May 1784 (sweep 224) and recorded, cL, rather B, R, r, brighter in the middle and colourless. It was preceded by many vacant fields and I had just been saying that I was upon nebulous ground." From the CGH, JH made the single observation "vF; L; R; gbM; 2' diam; resolved into stars 18m." In early catalogues NGC 6355 was described as an open cluster, with designations Cr 330 and OCl-1036 (Alter et al. 1970).

200/250mm - 8" (5/21/82): faint, small, round, diffuse, no resolution.

400/500mm - 17.5" (7/27/92): fairly faint, fairly small, 2' diameter, slightly elongated N-S, gradually increases to a 1' core. At 280x, appears granular and three or four very faint mag 15 stars are just visible. The brightest two stars are on north side of core.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb