Ever Wondered Who Invented Contact Lenses?

So, you've just acquired for yourself a wonderful new pair of contacts, have enjoyed the benefits of these tremendous little devices and now the question of who invented contact lenses is gnawing away at your mind. Fret not, dear reader, because that's what we're here for: to entertain and edify you as best as we possibly can. Sit back, relax, and learn about the invention of the contact lens.

Although contact lenses have only become a mainstay in the public domain over the last twenty years or so, the idea of contacts has been around, quite literally, for centuries. Leonardo Da Vinci first conceived of the idea, and drew sketches to prove it, almost three centuries before the first basic lenses were created. Since then the ideas that led to the invention of contacts have been developed and refined by a plethora of people. But it wasn't until 1888 that the first major breakthrough -- the creation of an all-glass contact lens -- would come about as a result of the efforts of Adolph Eugen Fick and Edouard Kalt, two independent researchers who reported their findings at the same time. In 1948, Kevin Touhy successfully applied for a patent for plastic contact lenses that covered only the cornea. As opposed to the sclerical (covers the entire eye) lenses that preceded them.

The inventor of contacts, or at least, the man most often cited as being responsible for the contact lens revolution, is Czechoslovakian native, Otto Wichterle. It is he who created the first water-absorbing soft contact lens. Using a children's play set he crafted a machine with which he was able to cast a handful of these devices. And with them, the age of modern contacts was born.

Thankfully, we need not reinvent the wheel, or the contact lens as the case may be. Thanks to the miracle of the internet (which Otto Wichterle was not responsible for), you can purchase every ophthalmic device your heart could possible desire, including virtually every form of Contact Lenses available on the market, from torics to colored cosmetic lenses. And to make things even easier for you, we've assembled all the necessary links just to the right of this page. And now that you know who invented soft lenses you can wear them proudly.

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