Spectacles and Other Vision Aids: A History and Guide to Collecting

This magnificently illustrated and beautifully designed work is the most comprehensive history ever written on the development of spectacles and other vision aids in Europe, America, Japan, and China. With over 780 photographs, of which 310 are in color, Dr. Rosenthal illustrates and analyzes the historical development of a wide variety of vision aids, from spectacles to opera glasses, tracing their development from antiquity to the present day. No other work has covered the field of vision aids on this grand a scale nor provided such magnificent illustrations of such a variety of specimens.

Every so often a book becomes an instant classic and defines the field that it covers. Such a book was written recently by J. William Rosenthal . . . a visual masterpiece . . . It belongs in the collection of everyone who is interested in the history of spectacles and other visual aids . . . . -- Ophthalmology Times July 1998

Noted collector of antique ophthalmic material J. William Rosenthal is founder and curator of the Jonas W. Rosenthal Memorial Ophthalmology Museum at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, ophthalmic consultant for the Smithsonian Institution, and a practicing ophthalmologist. His authoritative study of eyeglasses and other devices to improve vision covers the origins of the manufacture of glass in different regions, and how technological advances were joined with an increasing understanding of optical physics and the medical aspects of vision to provide more and more sophisticated eyeglasses. . . . This magnificently designed book is a thoroughly researched and well-organized reference work. The extensive illustrations show the wide range of factors influencing the shape and function of spectacles throughout the centuries. Specific manufacturing techniques, ophthalmological developments, and fashion trends are clearly indicated by a judicious selection of items from the author's collection and from other notable collections. Basic terms and subjects are clearly defined, and the chapters provide significant depth and always integrate each type of eyeglass or visual aid into the broader general history of spectacle. . . . In Spectacles and Other Vision Aids, Rosenthal demonstrates the important role to be played by the scholar-collector in making available for a wider audience the specialized knowledge gathered in the course of accumulating a private collection. -- AB Bookman's Weekly March 31, 1997