The History of the First Contact Lens

Contact lenses have become so commonplace that we tend to take their easy availability and affordability for granted. Many innovations in design and materials have taken place since the first contact lenses were used to correct vision.

Da Vinci's Idea

• Although it would be another 300 years before it was actually manufactured, Leonardo da Vinci is given credit for illustrating the concept of a contact lens in 1508.

Glass Lenses

• In 1827, English astronomer Sir John Herschel suggested grinding and fitting techniques that involved making a mold of the wearer's eyes. Using Herschel's ideas, German glassblower F.A. Muller created the first known glass contact lenses in 1887.

Plastic Lenses

• Beginning in 1936, hard plastic lenses that covered the entire cornea were developed. Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, they were made smaller and thinner.

Soft Contacts

• In 1961, Czechoslovakian chemist Otto Wichterle created the prototype of a casting machine for soft contact lenses using his son's erector set and parts from a bicycle. Soft lenses became commercially available in 1971. According to the American Optometric Association, they currently account for more than 80 percent of lens sales.

New Developments

• Today's contact lenses not only correct for near- and farsightedness, but for astigmatism as well. Technical advances include oxygen-permeable, bifocal, daily disposable and extended wear contact lenses.