It was discovered by the Russian astronomer G. N. Neujmin in 1916 at the Crimean Astrophysical Observatory on mount Koshka.
Neuimin graduated from St. Petersburg University (1910). From 1910, he worked at the Pulkovo Observatory, and from 1912, at its Simeiz branch, which he headed from 1925 to 1931 and from 1936 to 1941. In 1944, he was appointed director of the Pulkovo Observatory.
Also a lunar crater ( Neujmin ) is named in his honour.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/951_Gaspra

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simeiz_Observatory

The NASA probe Galileo imaged it on its way to Jupiter. That was not so easy because the asteroids position relative to the speeding spacecraft was not well known. To overcome this problem, a pioneering optical navigation campaign was implemented by the Galileo spacecraft team to reduce the uncertainty of Gaspra's position using images captured during the approach. This was successful and allowed the spacecraft to obtain images from as close as 5300 km

Distance from the Sun (au) : 2.237

Time: 20:37UT 2026-03-04 Exp. 53 x 30 sec.
Tel. 0.254m f/5.8 ST-10XME CCD @ -25°C 1.9"/pix
Odd Trondal Obs.code 238 (Uranium). Oslo Norway.