15 Interesting Facts about Glasses

Glasses were introduced to the world first time in 12th century or before it, in China. But these glasses were unable to shield the eyes from sunlight or any other glare. According to the available sources, it is explained that these glasses were used by judges to hide their expressions when they ask questions culprits or witnesses.  This was the history of glasses now we come to some interesting facts about glasses, some of which are hard to believe-

 

1.            The famous Hollywood movie named Matrix has an interesting record about sunglasses. The most number of actors wore sunglasses in any movie is Matrix. And the more interesting thing is, all the protagonist wore rounded lenses and the antagonist wore rectangular lenses.

2.            The costliest sunglasses on eBay were at the rate of $250,000 which is Elvis Presley’s personal Madison SQ garden sunglasses. This was not the quality of the glasses which made it so expensive; it was Elvis Presley and he was known as king of rock and roll.

3.            Another strange thing about glasses is, in the US someone loses, breaks or sits on a pair of sunglasses in every 14 minutes.

4.            The polarized sunglasses that you see around you, were invented in 1936 by Edwin H. Land, who made this by doing experiments with his patented Polaroid filter.

5.            A roman emperor Nero used emerald as binocular to watch gladiators games.

6.            Did you know that annual market of sunglasses at retail is $34 billion as I can also see around me that there is a boom to buy sunglasses, spectacles, frames and optical glasses online in India and when you Google it you will find that many other countries also have the same situation.

7.            Did you know that the first prescription lenses were built in 13th century in Italy. This was made of glass and these were actually contact lenses.

8.            An eminent scientist Benjamin Franklin who suffered from both farsightedness and nearsightedness, made the first bi-focal lenses.

9.            If citizens of some African countries want to buy eyeglasses then they will have to spend more than their 3 month’s salary.

10.        Almost 4 million pair of eyeglasses are dumped in the US in a single year.

11.        Did you know that most of these things you say glasses, are really made of plastic.

12.        The first thing invented as an eyesight aid was known as reading stone. It was invented around 1000 AD. This was useful for who were suffering from far-sighted. It worked like an magnifying glass. In this device, you have to put a sphere on the top of the writing and it magnifies the letter thus it helped people to read letters.

13.        Today people use eyeglasses to improve vision of the eyes. But you would wonder to know that in past many soldiers or pirates used to wear golden earrings to improve their eyesight. 

14.        No one knows that who is inventor of glasses.

15.        On eBay mens sunglasses are sold in every 90 seconds.