Ophthalmic surgical set used by Nelson Franklin Wetmore (1851-1926), a physician in Wisconsin and father of Alexander Wetmore, the sixth Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution. An inscription in the lid reads “EYE CASE / PAR 914 M.M.D. 1917 / G. P. PILLING & SON CO. / PHILADELPHIA / CONTRACT DATED JUNE 15TH 1917.”
This pair of Harlequin-shaped eyeglasses dates from about 1960. The frame is made from 12KT white gold and has a black enamel-like design on the rim and temples. The Ultex bifocal lenses are made each from one piece of ground glass. The nose pads and earpieces are covered in plastic. By the mid-twentieth century, the variety of styles, colors, and materials for eyewear had become limitless.
A strabismometer measures strabismus, a misalignment causing one eye to deviate inward (esotropia) toward the nose, or outward (exotropia), while the other eye remains focused. The “WEISS” inscription on the handle of this ivory example is that of a major medical instrument firm in London.
John Zachariah Laurence (1829 -- 1870), English opthalmologist and founder of the Ophthalmic Review, is credited with developing the strabismometer. For an illustration and description of its use, see his book, Optical defects of the eye, and their consequences, asthenopia and strabismus (Hardwick, London, 1865), pages 107-109.
Chrome plated, stainless steel ophthalmic scissors, made by V. Mueller in Chicago. These belonged to Milton Elliott Randolph (1905-1992), an ophthalmologist who taught at the Wilmer Eye Institute of the Johns Hopkins Medical School in Baltimore.
Ref: “Dr. M. Elliott Randolph, Ophthalmologist at Hopkins,” Baltimore Sun (Feb. 21, 1992).
This object is one of over 700 medically related objects used on the set of the television show M*A*S*H. Most of these items are authentic medical instruments, supplies, and equipment from the 1950s.
M*A*S*H was an award-winning television show based on the bestselling novel and Oscar winning motion picture film of the same title. It portrayed the lives of doctors and nurses assigned to a fictitious medical unit, the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, based in Uijeongbu, Korea during the 1950-1953 war. The program was initially broadcast from September 17, 1972 to February 28, 1983.
After the show ended in 1983, Twentieth Century Fox donated material from the two major sets, the “Swamp” and the “Operating Theater,” to the museum, along with scripts, photographs, and interviews with individuals who served in MASH units in Korea and Vietnam. See accessions 1983.0095, 1985.0335, 1988.0748, 1988.3163, and archival collection NMAH.AC.0117, for further MASH material.
This object is one of over 700 medically related objects used on the set of the television show M*A*S*H. Most of these items are authentic medical instruments, supplies, and equipment from the 1950s.
M*A*S*H was an award-winning television show based on the bestselling novel and Oscar winning motion picture film of the same title. It portrayed the lives of doctors and nurses assigned to a fictitious medical unit, the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital, based in Uijeongbu, Korea during the 1950-1953 war. The program was initially broadcast from September 17, 1972 to February 28, 1983.
After the show ended in 1983, Twentieth Century Fox donated material from the two major sets, the “Swamp” and the “Operating Theater,” to the museum, along with scripts, photographs, and interviews with individuals who served in MASH units in Korea and Vietnam. See accessions 1983.0095, 1985.0335, 1988.0748, 1988.3163, and archival collection NMAH.AC.0117, for further MASH material.
The “AO-DE ZENG / DIAGNOSTIC INSTRUMENTS” label in the box indicates that this battery-powered ophthalmoscope was made after De Zeng merged with the American Optical Company. This was apparently owned by “J. M. Postle, M.D.”