Oh, Jim!  You obviously have never heard the story of how the
Richard-Allan stains were developed.  It gives me great pleasure to share
this with you.  This is most definitely, NOT an urban myth!  Jerry
Fredenburg, being a former histologist/chemist, started messing around in
his home kitchen, ruined most of his wife's pots and pans and managed to
develop one heck of a hematoxylin.  The rest, as they say, is history.  He
is currently CEO of this company and, as he told me recently, he loves to
delegate the day-to-day responsibilities to others so he can go "play" in
the lab.  I believe I have most of these facts correct - although this was
shared with me over "cocktails" in the lounge of some NSH meeting site.
I'm  sure there are many 'netters who know the story better than I.
	You state -  "Our business does not make stains and we don't test
stains. You
ought to be concerned about any supplier making such claims and question
their veracity or indeed the quality of the supplied materials. Any
supplier offering "certified" stains is offering effectively the same
goods. The difference for the buyer is reliability delivery, price and good
communication.
Criminal behaviour, such as selling uncertified stains as certified I
believe is very, very rare."
	Hmmmm...you sell stains... but you don't test them or make them.  I
would be more concerned about that claim -  than making them in-house
(seems to me one would have more control over the final product).
	However, since I really don't know where Richard-Allan stains are
made - all I can do is reiterate that  I and several other labs in the area
have NEVER had a problem with our H&E stain in 20 years.  This is not
fiction or myth as daily QC sheets have been obtained for most of those
years.
	I'm sure there are many equal, high-quality staining companies
around the world.  I just happen to be familiar with this one.  I just
didn't want you to think that Jerry was a myth - although he may be
becoming "a legend in his own time" <grin>!
	Linda


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Linda Jenkins, HT
Clemson University
Department of Bioengineering
864.656.5553
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