By the turn of the 20th century the riflescope was not entirely unheard of in both target shooting and hunting. J. Stevens Arms and Tool Co. introduced a line of scopes in the early 1900s.

Yet another category is “long” eye-relief scopes, which, as might be expected, are for use on handguns held at arms’ length. Their eye relief can range from 15" to 21".

Eye relief can vary between brands and models of scopes. It also varies between the short and long zoom ranges of variable scopes. On a 3x9 scope, for example, the range of eye relief is much ...