Nifty fifties eyeglasses at the Spectacle Emporium

Nifty fifties eyeglasses at the Spectacle Emporium I grew up in the fifties and sixties and miss them greatly. How about you? Call us or leave us a Facebook message! Do you need bifocals? Do you like them?... etc.)

This page is to whet your appetite for our retro 50's and 60's eyeglasses and sunglasses! Custom eyeglasses and sunglasses, in frames from antique to ultra-modern, in a unique vintage setting. We can also help you find a great vision exam at a very low price, with or without vision insurance. By the way, a 98.6 human expert with over 40 years' experience can answer your questions more quickly and

completely in a few seconds than any website can in an hour of fruitless searching! And often, even with internet messaging, a few questions are necessary before a final answer can be arrived at (such as, what's your prescription? What kind are you presently wearing? This can take days of back-and-forth, but can be concluded in a few seconds or minutes on the old-fashioned telly, with no high-pressure! So we highly recommend contacting us via telephone:

745*3682 (area code 307.) HOURS:

By the way, we are often here later than the posted hours, and we make early and late appointments (also sunday and some holidays, when possible) to make YOUR life easier. Maybe you had to get off work to see the doctor, but you probably won't to see us. We also make area house calls where needed. That's one more reason they call us the Last Old-Fashioned Opticians! :)

The Spectacle Emporium, formerly known as Optical Fashions, has been making the world's finest eyeglasses and sunglasses since 1977. We specialize in fine FRAMES MADE IN THE USA and the FREE WORLD, from ANTIQUE to ULTRA-MODERN. Come visit the Last Old-Fashioned Optician, who spends an hour with each patient on average, designing the perfect pair of glasses to fit your personality, occupation, hobbies, and sports. Deal with a professional with over 45 years' experience instead of an amateur - and save thousands of dollars over a lifetime. When your vision is at stake, why risk it with an optical "sales clerk" with little or no experience?

*** VINTAGE EYEWEAR ***

Our vintage frames include styles from the American Revolutionary War, the Civil War, Victorian Era, Edwardian Era, Roaring 20's, 1930's, 1940's, the nifty fifties, sassy sixties, and those huge frames from the 70's & 80's. The Spectacle Emporium is a re-enactor's paradise!

*** ULTRA-MODERN EYEWEAR ***

If you like ultra-modern eyeglasses that stand out from the crowd, you need to see our fashion show. Just go to our main page and click the PHOTOS tab. Then click the "ALBUMS" tab to see ALL our photo albums. (or cut and paste the following link: http://www.facebook.com/media/albums/?id=126605314077804

*** CONTEMPORARY EYEWEAR ***

Do we have standard, everyday frame styles? Yes, we do. Since we are not located on Fifth Avenue or other such extravagant street, we can share our savings on rent with you - but our styles are second to none.

*** MORE NOTES ABOUT OUR HOURS ***

(EVENING, SUNDAY, AND HOLIDAY HOURS BY APPOINTMENT.) We are often open after the listed closing time. Please call for special closure days, especially in Spring and Fall. Occasional closures for special assignment or continuing education (to keep our skills and our certification up) may be required. We are closed Saturdays for worship. We are available Sundays, evenings, and most holidays by appointment, so if our schedule doesn't match yours, by all means call and we'll arrange a time that is good for both of us!

*** SPECIAL CLOSING DATES, Sept. and Oct. 2023 ***



*** PLEASE CALL AHEAD IF COMING FROM AFAR! ***

Especially if you're driving or flying from afar, please call us at (307) 745-3682 ahead of time. To keep up my training to give you the best service in the industry, I need to attend classes now and again. I don't want to miss you! I occasionally have to run to the post office or mailbox to send a rush job out, or I may not hear the phone because of the vacuum cleaner or lens edger, or we're shoveling our (considerable) winter snow. So please call back or leave a message if we don't answer the first time.

*** PARKING ***


There is diagonal street parking in front of the Spectacle Emporium. Parking is usually easiest in the morning and on Sundays (I'm here SOME Sundays, or by appointment after hours)... but if there are no spaces, don't panic! There is all-day parking on First Street about one block south and one block west of us (just north of the old Depot). There are also lots of free spaces behind Coal Creek Coffee on Grand Avenue (about a block West of us)... but watch the signs, as some spaces are reserved or not all-day! There is also a free lot on Custer Street (2 blocks south), just west of 2nd Street. Also, if you call us at (307) 745-3682 as you're heading north up our alley from Garfield Street, we can sometimes guide you into a space. Be sure to call -- please don't park in the wrong place and get towed. I can even help you park and help you get on your way after your visit.

*** REACHING OLD TOWN LARAMIE, WYOMING ***

Laramie is two hours north and west of Denver. You can take I-25 to Cheyenne, and then I-80 to Laramie. Or, if you'd like more scenery, jump off I-25 at Ft. Collins and follow U.S. 287 to Laramie (this is shorter but about the same amount of time, and will put you right on 3rd Street in Laramie, and we're just a block west of 3rd, just south of Grand Avenue.) We are conveniently located near the intersection of the I-80 business route (Grand Avenue) and US 287/30, and about 45 miles west of I-25. We are located on 2nd Street, just a block west of US 287 / 30, and 4 doors (not stores) south of Grand Avenue, which is the I-80 business route. We are about 2 minutes north of the I-80 third street exit (then turn left on Grand Avenue, then left at the next corner (2nd Street). We're the fourth door (not store) on your left.

*** HOUSE CALLS BY APPOINTMENT AS NEEDED ***

This week marks a biggie...49 years ago, Steve, the  , opened the   in  !   Stay tuned!(We'll be closed after 3 PM today...
04/01/2026

This week marks a biggie...
49 years ago, Steve, the , opened the in ! Stay tuned!
(We'll be closed after 3 PM today, and all day tomorrow (Thursday) for meetings.)
307*745*3682 305 S. 2nd Street (4 doors south of Grand Avenue)
Do the people who actually FIT your glasses know what they're doing? Steve has been making eyeglasses far longer than anyone else around here!

Johnny's brother was Robert Crawford, Jr., who starred as Andy in the Laramie TV series (whom I've met in Laramie!)  :)
03/30/2026

Johnny's brother was Robert Crawford, Jr., who starred as Andy in the Laramie TV series (whom I've met in Laramie!) :)

"Johnny Crawford, an actor, eyed a pile of pancakes in an International House of Pancakes, circa 1960.Credit...Keystone Features" ~ Laurie ~ 😚 "Johnny Crawford was an American actor and singer, best known for his role as Mark McCain in the television series "The Rifleman." He began his career as one of the original Mouseketeers and was active in the entertainment industry from 1955 until 1999, later leading the Johnny Crawford Orchestra." Johnny passed in 2021. R.I.P. 😢Video songs in comments below.

03/30/2026

In the 1950s, the electric typewriter was the pinnacle of office technology — fast, precise, and completely, maddeningly unforgiving.
One mistake meant retyping the entire page.
Bette Nesmith Graham had made a lot of pages in her time. A single mother who had dropped out of high school, later earned her diploma through night school, and was supporting her young son Michael on a secretary's salary, she understood better than most what it cost — in time, in paper, in dignity — to be held hostage by an uncorrectable error.
Then she watched a sign painter at work.
During a bank window display, she noticed how the sign painter dealt with mistakes — not by starting over, but by simply painting over the error with the background color and continuing. The logic was elegant. The application to typing was obvious. At least, it was obvious to Bette Nesmith Graham.
She went home and started experimenting in her kitchen.
Using tempera paint, a fine watercolor brush, and years of trial and error to refine the formula, Graham developed a white correction fluid that could be brushed over a typed error, dried quickly, and typed over cleanly — leaving no visible trace of the mistake beneath. She mixed batches herself. She filled bottles by hand. She began quietly distributing it free to other secretaries in her building — watching them use it, gathering feedback, adjusting the formula.
She called it "Mistake Out" and began selling it from her home around 1956.
The demand was immediate. Secretaries understood the product's value instinctively — because they lived the problem it solved every single day. Word spread through office buildings the way genuinely useful things spread: person to person, without advertising, because the product simply worked.
Graham approached IBM about purchasing the invention.
IBM passed.
She kept building anyway — eventually renaming the product "Liquid Paper", filing for a patent, and formally establishing the Liquid Paper Corporation. Then came one of the most satisfying accidents in business history: while typing a letter at her secretarial job, Graham accidentally signed the letter with her company's name instead of her employer's.
She was fired.
The firing freed her. With no job to return to, Graham committed entirely to Liquid Paper — building the company from her kitchen table into a multi-million-dollar enterprise that eventually employed hundreds of people and produced millions of bottles annually, sold in 31 countries.
By 1979, the Gillette Corporation purchased Liquid Paper for $47.5 million — a sum that represented one of the most remarkable entrepreneurial journeys in American business history. A high school dropout. A single mother. A kitchen chemistry project. A $47.5 million exit.
Graham died in 1980 — just six months after the sale — but not before establishing two foundations dedicated to supporting women's causes and innovative education, ensuring that her wealth would continue creating opportunities for others long after she was gone.
Her son Michael Nesmith — the young boy she had raised on a secretary's salary while mixing correction fluid in the kitchen — had become a member of The Monkees, one of the most commercially successful pop groups of the 1960s.
She was proud of him.
But Bette Nesmith Graham's story was the better one.
A mistake that couldn't be corrected led to a correction that couldn't be stopped.
She mixed it herself. In her kitchen. By hand.
And she sold it for $47.5 million.

BIG  BOY, the famous steam locomotive came to town today.  That's why I'm open earlier than usual, to help ya be yer gre...
03/29/2026

BIG BOY, the famous steam locomotive came to town today. That's why I'm open earlier than usual, to help ya be yer great-grandparent, since yer livin' in th' past, like me (the Last Old-Fashioned Optician & photographer!) Drop on by. I have frames from the 1700's & 1800's, to put YOUR lenses in... AND scenic photos for a fraction of what they'd cost you in Aspen, Jackson, Santa Fe, Fifth Avenue, or San Fran. Drop on by... 305 S. 2nd Street, just 4 doors south of Grand Avenue, on the original Transcontinental Highway!

03/29/2026

Hey! The BIG BOY steam locomotive
is comin' to town this mornin'!
And th' is OPEN. Livin' in th' past? Wanna be yer great grandparent? I can help!! Antique frames, every era up to the ultra-mod, with YOUR prescription or sunglass lenses. AND - LARAMIE SOUVENIRS, hysterical (oops - historical) tours! 307*745*3682
Also: check out https://www.facebook.com/Old.Town.Laramie

Historical museum - focus on railroad and local history.

03/28/2026

PLEASE NOTE:
We'll be having special hours the week of March 29, 2026!
* We will be opening early on Sunday, March 29. Hope to be open by 10 AM for the crowd that will be here to see the BIG BOY steam locomotive come through at about 11:15. You can also come by after that event!
* We'll be closing early on Tuesday, Marrch 31 and April 1. Stay tuned for more details.
* We will be closed Thursday, April 2 and Wednesday, April 8, and Saturdays (as usual.)

More details about times will be forthcoming. Thank you!

03/26/2026

Lots of reporters and photographers came to interview and photograph Groucho as he approached his 85th birthday in 1975. This nice closeup of Groucho in his living room was taken by L.A. Times staff photographer Rick Meyer.
-caption and picture Steve Stoliar.

03/25/2026

Love this movie! " 'A Spoonful of Sugar' is a song from the 1964 Disney film 'Mary Poppins,' composed by the Sherman Brothers. It features Mary Poppins encouraging the children to clean their room by making the task seem fun and enjoyable." ~Laurie ~ 🤓

03/24/2026

The Lennon Sisters perform with George Burns in 1964 on the first season of "The Hollywood Palace."******* BE SURE TO SUBSCRIBE ABOVE *******Our website:▶ ht...

03/24/2026

"Bob Hope, right, with early comedic partner George Byrne in a promotional photo for their vaudeville act, circa 1922 Byrne later started his own Dance Studio, teaching Eccentric Dance...1926"
~Laurie ~ 🧐 (Not to be confused with George Burns)
https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/bobhope/vaude.html

Hey, all ye sheiks & flappers...  check out our Roaring Twenties eyewear (and all the other eras, from the 1700's to the...
03/23/2026

Hey, all ye sheiks & flappers... check out our Roaring Twenties eyewear (and all the other eras, from the 1700's to the ultra-modern. Genuine antique frames, with YOUR prescription or sunglass lenses. No kiddin'... they're the cat's meoww! :)
305 S. 2nd Street, 4 doors south of Grand Avenue in Old Town Laramie. 307*745*3682
https://www.facebook.com/Spectacle.Emporium

I know most of our downtown businesses are closed Sunday and Monday... but we're NOT.  And why not come down now, since ...
03/22/2026

I know most of our downtown businesses are closed Sunday and Monday... but we're NOT. And why not come down now, since you're off work and the free parking is super-easy, right out front! We can save you hundreds of dollars on your glasses or sunglasses, and our stuff's not made out of cheap materials by slave labor in countries that hate us. You've never seen an optical store like this... coming up on our 49th anniversary! :) 😎 👓
305 S. 2nd Street (4 doors south of Grand Avenue, on the original Transcontinental Highway!
307*745*3682 https://www.facebook.com/Spectacle.Emporium

Address

305 S 2nd Street
Laramie, WY
82070

Opening Hours

Monday 10am - 6pm
Tuesday 10am - 6pm
Wednesday 10am - 6pm
Thursday 10am - 6pm
Friday 10am - 4pm

Telephone

(307) 745-3682

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