(FORTUNE Magazine) – Laughing Sal, a gap-toothed clown, is hardly your typical civic icon. But after 11 years greeting visitors at San Francisco's free Musee Mecanique--the world's largest publicly accessible collection of vintage coin-operated amusements, there since the '20s--her looming homelessness has made the cackling crone a cause celebre.

Come Sept. 10, when the National Park Service renovates the Cliff House next door, Sal will get the boot--unlikely to return. The prospect of finding 5,000 square feet in high-rent San Francisco is a daunting one for 80-year-old Edward Zelinsky, who bought his first machine at age 11 and whose collection now exceeds 300. All still work at the drop of a coin: Love Meters, century-old hand-cranked motion-picture machines, mummy fortune tellers, late-1800s nudie stereo-optic machines, and the guillotine diorama, "The French Execution." Not to mention Susie (above), always up for a can-can.

Zelinsky hasn't yet despaired of relocating the fragile relics. "It'll be a big job to move," he sighs, and adds without much conviction, "and one day move back." --Mark Ehrman

Musee Mecanique 1090 Point Lobos, San Francisco; 415-386-1170; www.museemecanique.com