[2] Kohoutek was discovered during World War II on 23 March 1942, by German astronomer Karl Reinmuth at Heidelberg Observatory in southwest Germany,[8] Ten days prior to its discovery, the body was observed at Turku Observatory, Finland.
[8] Since the discovery was made in the second half of March, the letter "E" in the provisional designation is erroneous.
[1] In December 2014, a rotational lightcurve of Kohoutek was obtained from photometric observations in the R-band at the Palomar Transient Factory in California.
Lightcurve analysis gave a rotation period of 3.68 hours with a brightness variation of 0.31 magnitude (U=2).
[3] This minor planet was named in honor of the Czech astronomer, Luboš Kohoutek (born 1935), former staff member of the Hamburg-Bergedorf Observatory and prolific observer and discoverer of minor planets and comets, most notably 75D/Kohoutek, 76P/West–Kohoutek–Ikemura, and the long-period Comet Kohoutek.