Truhlsen-Marmor Museum of Eye

10/08/2026

With Halloween and Día de los Mu***os around the corner, our popular Craft & Learn: Ojo de Dios workshop returns with two hands-on sessions.
Join us on Saturday, Oct. 24, or Saturday, Oct. 31, at 2 p.m.Learn more about this ritual object from the Huichol indigenous population of Mexico, then make your own “God’s eye” ornament to take home.

The event is free but requires an RSVP at https://ow.ly/ahwq50ZRElq.

10/06/2026

Ocular Oddities: After Hours returns for its third year by popular demand. Join us on Saturday, October 31, from 5:30 to 8 p.m. to explore eerie artifacts from the museum vault, including 19th-century hand-blown glass eyeballs, articulated skulls, symbolic eye milagros, and more. The expanded event will also feature special presentations highlighting some of the weirder and wilder stories in ophthalmic history.

This is a 21+ ticketed event. Your $20 ticket includes after-hours access to the museum, a hosted b**r and w**e bar, with all proceeds benefiting ongoing museum exhibits and educational programming. The first twenty attendees will receive a free Ocular Oddities poster to take home! Get tickets at https://ow.ly/TT0250ZREkO.

10/04/2026

that St. Francis of Assisi (c1181 – 1226) likely suffered from trachoma? St. Francis, the founder of the Franciscan Order and patron saint of the poor and of animals, picked up a blinding eye infection towards the end of his life during travel in the Middle East. He was treated with eye salves and plasters, and eventually his doctors applied hot irons to his face to treat the disease.

Other about St. Francis include that the museum’s hometown, San Francisco, California, was named for him and today is his Saint’s Day. Learn more about historical treatments for trachoma in our online exhibit at https://ow.ly/Ueik50ZQm9E.

09/25/2026

Guess the object is back! Can you guess what “Fox’s Gold Sphere” was used for? It is made of solid gold.

We’ll put the correct answer in the comments below.

09/18/2026

NEW BLOG POST: Learn about how the history of optical toys may have begun before the Victorian era with the thaumatrope — it changed science education for children and led to the creation of motion pictures, but the true inventor may never be known. Discover the story on the Eye Witness Blog at https://ow.ly/BAr050ZFOZN.

This blog post was written by Joey Patire, a museum studies graduate student at University of San Francisco. Are you a current student looking for a museum internship? Submit an interest form at https://ow.ly/2om550ZFOZQ.

09/11/2026

NEW ONLINE EXHIBIT: “Bacteria, Immigration, and Public Health: Trachoma” has a new home on our website. Read about the history of trachoma, a bacterial infection of the eye and eyelids, and learn about its impact on public health efforts in the United States. Visit the online exhibit at https://ow.ly/j6Fy50ZFOTN.

This online exhibit features photographs of some of the historical artifacts displayed in the physical exhibit. You can still see the physical exhibit in the museum until May 2027. Plan a visit to experience it in person at https://ow.ly/vigh50ZFOTO.

09/06/2026

MUSEUM UPDATE: Summer hours end today! Starting next week, the museum will resume our regular hours of 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.

Learn more about our hours and holidays at https://ow.ly/N8E350Zu2yT.

09/02/2026

NEW BLOG POST: Dr. Surbhi Bansal from VCU School of Medicine on the MCV Campus tracks the fall of the Mughal Empire in India through three incidents of blinding. Read about these intriguing incidences in Indian history on the Eye Witness Blog at https://www.aao.org/museum-blog/detail/political-eye-when-blinding-replaced-blade.

This blog post is the second in a series of guest posts from the Cogan Ophthalmic History Society and was presented at the Cogan Society’s annual meeting in Richmond, Virginia on April 26, 2026.

Thank you, Dr. Bansal for sharing this with us!

08/28/2026

Thank you to our amazing summer interns! This summer, graduate students from University of San Francisco and SFSU Museum Studies Program made a huge impact in both collections and public programming. We appreciate all of your hard work, and wish you the best of luck in your museum careers!

Interested in interning at the Museum of the Eye for class credit? Submit an interest form at https://forms.office.com/pages/responsepage.aspx?id=0_0ikSx2vkWs1ZNPcXWtWZESdpPVf5NGhv4w41qLMUZUMU9NMjFVQlVERzhPVFpGUjI4Tkc3VDRaNi4u&route=shorturl.

The Museum of the Eye® seeks self-motivated credit seeking students for internships. Through hands-on experience, interns will develop skills in museum administration, visitor experience, public programs, collection management, social media, and more. The museum currently offers two different i...

08/21/2026

NEW BLOG POST: a second installation of trachoma stories! In this edition of the Eye Witness Blog, we follow a group of Russian religious separatists on a surprising path to Angel Island in California and their experience with trachoma screenings. Read more at https://ow.ly/L4qM50Zu2va.

Images: (1) An announcement of the arrival of Russian Molokan immigrants in the San Francisco Call, 1905, (2) Angel Island Immigration Station, c1890, (3) A view of Angel Island from the Museum of the Eye offices
Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation