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- Tower Optical Company, Inc. is a small, Norwalk, Connecticut-based company which has manufactured a binocular tower viewer used at major tourist sites in the United States and Canada since 1932. The company's large, silver-colored devices are used at Niagara Falls, the Empire State Building and other locations. Only about 35 of the viewers are manufactured each year, but several thousand are maintained by the company. Tower Optical has various arrangements with owners of the sites where the devices are located. Where the viewers are free, they are leased; at other locations, revenue is shared between the company and the site owner. Each machine can hold up to 2,000 quarters. The binocular machine has essentially kept its distinctive, tubby shape since it was first manufactured, a deliberate strategy "to preserve its identity", according to Bonnie Rising, the third-generation owner of the family business. When coin-operated, the machines can be timed for roughly 1.5 to 2.5 minutes. (en)
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