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I. William Collins, OD ’47 - who, alongside his wife Suzanne, established the I. William Collins Contact Lens Science Award in 2021 to benefit students at the Pennsylvania College of Optometry (PCO), Drexel University - passed away on May 27, 2025, at his home in Sarasota, Florida. He was 98.
He was born on March 31, 1927, in Steubenville, Ohio, to Albert and Berdie (Goldberger) Collins. Shortly after, the family relocated to West Philadelphia, where he was raised. On November 20, 1955, he married Suzanne (Feit) in Pottstown, Pennsylvania.
Dr. Collins was active during his years at PCO, serving as vice president of his class, as a member of the tennis and basketball teams, on the staffs of the Iris, the PCO yearbook, and the Pupil, the bi-monthly student publication.
Dr. Collins started his own practice in 1958 in Pottstown. By the mid-1980s, he had become frustrated that commercial eyeglass companies were receiving discounts the smaller private practices couldn't get from manufacturers. So, he rallied 18 fellow optometrists to form The Source Buying Group, which grew into a thriving business that eventually would feature 800 members in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware.
Dr. Collins was a member of the American Optometric Association (AOA) and was a Diplomate in the American Academy of Optometry’s (AAO) Contact Lens Section.
He was an elected member of the then PCO Board of Trustees in 1992 and became a board trustee emeritus in 2015 of Salus University, which PCO established in 2008. He served the College as a visiting clinical instructor and associate professor of optometry. In 1997, he received PCO’s Presidential Medal of Honor.
He eventually sold his Pottstown practice to his partner, James J. Suydam Jr., OD ‘84, in 1997, and then sold The Source Buying Group to another buying group in 1998, retiring with his wife, Suzanne, to Florida.
Dr. Collins and his wife have been generous supporters of PCO/Salus with the Pediatric and Binocular Vision Service at The Eye Institute named in the couple’s honor.
The I. William Collins OD, FAAO, Contact Lens Science Award, is a scholarship given to two PCO students. The award is designed for students who rotated through the Contact Lens track and showed exceptional case management skills, which includes the clinical examination, design, fitting and troubleshooting of specialty contact lenses.
In addition to his parents, he was preceded in death by his wife Suzanne, who passed away in 2008 after 52 years of marriage.
Survivors include his daughter, Cynthia Collins; her husband, Joseph Oldeker; and two grandsons, Joey Oldeker and Ethan Oldeker.
