William Herschel discovered NGC 6500 = H III-957 = St XII-85, along with NGC 6501, on 29 Jun 1799 (sweep 1090) and recorded "Two, both vF, vS. The place is that of the following one NGC 6501], the preceding one is about 4' more south and about 5 or 6 sec of time preceding." His position is about 25 sec of time too far west and 3' too far south. Édouard Stephan independently found the pair a century later (15 Jul 1880) and noted his object was probably identical to GC 4348 [NGC 6500], but he was not certain as WH's position was poor.

400/500mm - 17.5" (7/1/89): moderately bright, fairly small, round, small bright core, stellar nucleus. Forms a pair with similar NGC 6501 2.3' NNE. Located 6.1' WNW of mag 6.6 SAO 103227!

600/800mm - 24" (7/14/18): at 225x; bright, moderately large, elongated 3:2 SW-NE, well concentrated with a prominent core and small intense nucleus, much fainter halo. Forms a very striking pair with similar NGC 6501 2.3' NNE. The star field is rich and highlighted by STF 2245, a gorgeous bright pair of mag 7.4/7.5 stars at 2.6" separation, which is situated 5.6' ESE. The double star forms the vertex angle of a thin isosceles triangle with the two galaxies. An extremely low surface brightness galaxy (uncatalogued) was highly suspected just 0.9' N of the double star.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb