The Club Newsletter was started in September 1982 as 'The Bulletin' by our late Founder Derek Davidson and consisted of six pages covering a variety of topics of interest. Derek continued as Editor with quarterly issues and increased the pages to eight and 'The Bulletin' became 'The Newsletter' with issue 11 in April 1985. Subsequently it was given the official title of "Ophthalmic Antiques". Ronald MacGregor took over as Editor for the July 1990 issue and gradually increased the content until it reached the current 16 pages in 1997. Two volumes of 'Extracts' have been published, the first in 1986 covering the first ten issues and the second in 1996 covering the preceeding ten years. With the April 2006 issue colour pictures were introduced for the front and back covers. An enlarged edition for July 2007 celebrated the Newsletter's 100th issue and issue 112, in July 2010 with extra colour pages, commemorated the rediscovery of the Heymann Collection. Ronald retired at the end of 2009 after 19 years service and our new Editor, Tim Bowden, started with issue 110 for January 2010.

The Newsletter is now widely recognised as an authoritative source of ophthalmic and optical history and is used by researchers and often quoted in learned papers and articles. Valerie Mellor has spent a great deal of time over the past ten years producing an Index so that this enormous amount of information can be readily accessed.  She has produced a series of Indices, which have been issued free to members.  The latest main Index in 2004 covered issues 1 to 85 and there have since been three further supplements updating to Issue 109. Our future aim will be to get the Index on line eventually. Photocopies of individual articles or complete issues can be obtained from  Membership Secretary, Peter Watkins, see SHOP for costs.

Members are encouraged to write articles or provide news for the Newsletter.  The Editor works well in advance of the publication months of January, April, July and October and any entries must reach him well beforehand, his address is:


T.J.Bowden
Meadow Cottage, Green Farm Lane
Shorne, Gravesend
Kent  DA12 3HL
and Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it