Note: There is no mag 13.5 star to the ENE, so my observation may refer to another galaxy.

William Herschel discovered NGC 7647 = H III-473 on 29 Nov 1785 (sweep 480) and recorded "eF, cL, some doubt left. It precedes an irregular row of scattered stars. His RA is 10 seconds too small, but the description matches.

400/500mm - 17.5" (9/26/92): extremely faint, very small, slightly elongated N-S. A mag 13 star is 1.5' ENE. Appears unusually faint for 15.2z due to low surface brightness.

600/800mm - 24" (9/2/16): fairly faint, fairly small, slightly elongated, 30"x25", gradually increases to the center. With averted vision a very low surface brightness outer halo was detectable.

NGC 7647 is the brightest galaxy (cD) in AGC 2589, a richness class 0 cluster at a distance of ~560 million l.y. Surrounding NGC 7647 is a large number of very faint galaxies with PGC 71331 (2.1' N), PGC 71337 (2.2' NE), PGC 71326 (1.7' S) and PGC 71317 (2.3' WSW), forming a small rectangle around the bright elliptical. Additionally, I picked up PGC 71320 6.2' NNW, PGC 71324 8.4' N and CGCG 454-062 8.1' SSW. These 7 additional members were very faint or extremely faint and generally 0.2' in size.

Notes by Steve Gottlieb