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Off the Path Revisited: America's Favorite Viewing Machine

WSHU | By Davis Dunavin
Published July 30, 2021 at 4:54 PM EDT
Tower Optical employees service a row of machines and collect quarters outside Johnny’s Reef in City Island, N.Y.
Davis Dunavin
/
WSHU
Tower Optical employees service a row of machines and collect quarters outside Johnny’s Reef in City Island, N.Y.";

If you're on the road this summer, you may find yourself looking at a scenic vista through one of those coin-operated viewing machines. You know the ones — binoculars on poles, encased in a metal shell. And if you do, there's a good chance you're looking through a machine assembled in a small factory in Norwalk, Connecticut.
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Off the Path Off the PathOff the PathDavis Dunavin
Davis Dunavin
Davis Dunavin loves telling stories, whether on the radio or around the campfire. He started in Missouri and ended up in Connecticut, which, he'd like to point out, is the same geographic trajectory taken by Mark Twain.
See stories by Davis Dunavin