BY ED CLAPPER Now considered expected equipment on modern rifles, telescopic sights have a murky history. Some sources say the first ones were made between 1835 and 1840. Other undocumented references point to them being around even earlier. But we know this for sure: scopes offer two enormous advantages over iron sights and both involve more precise aiming. First, our eyes cannot focus on multiple objects at different distances. With iron sights, the shooter must focus on the front sight, place it in the notch or ring of the out-of-focus rear sight and position those aligned sights on the spot of the blurry target he or she wants to hit. A scope eliminates all that; you simply place the center of the scope's reticle on the desired point of impact and shoot. Second, scopes generally magnify the target, making it appear closer. They do so in one of two ways. First-focal-plane scopes, also called front-plane scopes, enlarge both the target and reticle. Though I've never SCOPING OUT SCOPES AUGUST 2023 57