Fritz Zwicky was the first to start systematically photographing
peculiar galaxies using his 18 inch Schmidt camera at Palomar. Using
these images, he quickly concluded that many of the narrow filaments
that he observed must be due to tides stemming from gravitational
interactions. In a 1953 issue of Physics Today, he described
these filaments as tides and countertides and furthermore, correctly
deduced that the narrowest of them must be sheets of matter seen edge
on; furthermore, he emphasized that much of the visible matter in the bridges and tails
must consist of stars. Shown below is one of his sketches - "the
possible formation of an intergalactic bridge between two galaxies
passing each other".
In the sketch, Zwicky considers the possible bridge formation between
two interacting galaxies; the resulting configuration closely
resembles Arp 96. Note that the lower galaxy in instances (a) and (b)
becomes the upper galaxy in instances (c) and (d).