Contact Lens Technique: a concise and comprehensive textbook for practitioners

Historical Significance: This is probably the first book devoted entirely to contact lenses. It might be said to have been preceded by a manual written by William Feinbloom entitled The Feinbloom Plastic Contact Lens. manual of instructions 45 pages published in 1940 but that book is more an instruction manual for a particular contact lens type than a contact lens textbook. This 1st edition by Beacher was self published and possibly also self printed and bound. A second edition of 125 pages was also published in 1941 by New York Contact Lens Laboratories with further editions in 1944, 1946 and 1974. Other early contact lens books followed quickly: Obrig's Contact Lenses in 1942, Feinbloom's The practice of fitting contact lenses in 1942 (based on articles published in J Amer Optom Assoc 1941), Anderson's Technique of fitting contact lenses in 1944, Dickinson and Hall's An introduction to the prescribing and fitting of contact lenses in 1946, Salvatori's A scientific method of fitting contact lenses in 1947, Bier's Contact lens routine and practice in 1953. Most of these books are held by the Kett Optometry Museum. Beacher (1905-1987) qualified in optometry at the Pennsylvania State College of Optometry in 1927, where he taught from 1929 to 1931. He wrote several other optometry and three psychology textbooks and his autobiography (1985). See Hindsight 2015; 46(2): 27-31.