Why sit around waiting for a galactic supernova when you can observe an extragalactic one almost any time? And not just one. Half a dozen or more become bright enough to view through a 25cm scope in most years.
French astronomer Ludovic Gully discovered the first supernova ever seen outside the Milky Way by accident during a public observing event on August 17, 1885. He dismissed it as scattered moonlight and didn’t follow up. Three nights later, German astronomer Ernst Hartwig was showing some friends the Andromeda Nebula (as the galaxy was then called) through the 23cm (9-inch) refractor at Dorpat Observatory in Estonia, when he noticed a ‘new’ star near the galaxy’s nucleus. Hartwig wanted to alert other astronomers of his discovery, but observatory director Ludwig Schwarz insisted he wait to re-observe it without interference from moonlight to verify the object wasn’t an artifact.
No doubt chomping at the bit, Hartwig nevertheless
