The Collection

The Museum of Vision traces the history of ophthalmology through its collection of over 10,000 artifacts, rare books and archives.  The collection, dating from the third-century B.C., includes surgical instruments, spectacles, numismatics, stamps, personal papers and oral histories.

You are invited to view a selection from our collections here.  Please contact the museum at museum@aao.org for more information, to perform historical research or to simply visit our gallery.

Artifacts

• Art
• Alternative Medicine
• Instruments
• Pharmaceuticals

Archives

• Edward Jackson, MD Collection
• Irving Leopold, MD Collection
• George Kambara, MD Collection
• Robert C. Drews, MD Collection

Rare Books (Illustrations)

• Abbildungen des menschlichen auges by Samuel Thomas Sommering. Frankfurt. 1801
• Memoires de L’Academie Royal de Chirurgie, illustration by Jacques Daviel
• Descripto Anatomica Oculi Humani Iconibus Illustrata by Johanne Gottfried Zinn. Gottingen. 1755