After my appointment as head of the Orthopaedic Department in the Surgical Clinic of the Wilhel- mina Gasthuis in Amsterdam, January 1953, I have had the privilege of a close and daily co-operation with my second-incharge M. J. Kingma. Amongst other problems, reconstructive surgery with the aid of bone-grafting captured the interest of both of us. In vol. XII, fasc. 3 (1960) of the Archivum of calf bone preserved by refrigeration was Chirurgicum Neerlandicum Kingma wrote: 'The use introduced into surgery in the Netherlands by Meiss in 1951. After the appearance of Meiss' reports on his...