Encyclopedia Dubuque
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Affiliated with the Local History Network of the State Historical Society of Iowa, and the Iowa Museum Association.
TABAK, Sol
TABAK, Sol. (Brooklyn, NY, July 14, 1923--San Diego, CA, Jan. 2, 2002). Tabak served in the medical corps in Iceland during WORLD WAR II. He then attended the Illinois School of Optometry and graduated in 1949. He came to Dubuque in 1950 and became the principal optometrist at Dubuque Optometric Center.
Tabak became an acknowledged expert on the use of contact lenses and lectured worldwide on the topic. He was considered a pioneer in the subject when he won an early optometric-academy distinction for the lenses.
When he retired from the Dubuque Human Rights Commission in December 1985, Tabak held the record for length of service-thirteen years out of the fourteen the commission had been in existence. He was three times the president of Temple Beth El. He also served the DUBUQUE ART ASSOCIATION, DUBUQUE SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA, and BARN COMMUNITY THEATER. Tabak was recognized "as a lethal force to the dynamic known as "group-think."
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Source:
Hogstrom, Erik, "Optometrist Sol Tabak Remembered as Pioneer," Telegraph Herald, January 8, 2002, p. 3
