Fixation on Histology

A Tribute to Freida Carson, PhD, HT(ASCP) - "Get Involved with Your Profession"

  
Freida Carson, PhD, HT(ASCP)

Freida Loyce Carson. Encourager, friend, educator, colleague, a great and inspiring mentor!

 

Editor’s Note:  Freida’s memorial service will be Thursday, January 20, 2002, at 1:00 pm central time, and a Committal Service will be held graveside on January 31 in Herne, Texas, where Freida will be laid to rest alongside her mother and father. 

Please leave a short comment below. NSH will share your thoughts with Pastor McGuire to incorporate them into her memorial service. 

I began my career in Histotechnology in the fall, 1972 in a small college histology laboratory. I wanted to learn and understand more about Histology as it was referred to at that time. Histotechnology was a new word to me but seemed very interesting. I explored further training and came across the School of Histotechnology at the University of Tennessee Medical Units in Memphis, TN.


I applied, was accepted, and began my formal training in January 1976. My professor was Gerre Wells, Supervisor of City of Memphis Hospital Histopathology Laboratory and Education Coordinator of the Histotechnology Program at the University of Tennessee. Gerre wanted her students to learn Histotechnology and to meet and interact with particular people in Histotechnology, one of whom was Dr. Freida Carson. I was happy to meet these colleagues of Gerre’s. I was impressed with Dr. Carson, the Director of the Histopathology Laboratory at Baylor University Medical Center in Dallas, TX. I learned that Dr. Carson had one of the first ten (10) Histologic Technician Schools in the United States to receive approval from the Board of Schools of Medical Education of the Medical Association, marking the beginning of national approval for Schools of Histologic Technique. 

My instructor Gerre Wells wanted us to join the American Society for Medical Technology (ASMT) as HT students. NSH was just in its infancy, and ASMT had a discipline called the Scientific Assembly that had a section referred to as the Histology Section.   Dr. Carson was a member of ASMT and served as the Chair of the ASMT Histology Section of the Scientific Assembly. In 1980 she was awarded the Texas Women’s University Distinguished Alumnae Award in Denton, TX….” for her devotion to enhancing the quality of medicine through the training of technologists and to perfecting the science of Histology.”  Dr. Mary Evelyn Blagg Huey, Texas Women’s University President, said, “Dr. Carson’s role as the only woman histologist and one of the only histologists in the US holding the Doctor of Philosophy degree bears evidence of her pioneering instincts.”  As a young student, Gerre Wells and Dr. Carson inspired me to learn as much as possible about this profession. Later, Gerre told me that Dr. Carson wanted technicians to “get involved in the profession.”    

     
I attended one of Dr. Carson’s lectures at one of Gerre Wells’ Continuing Education Seminars, and already I wanted to learn more from her. In 1983 I received a brochure about an upcoming staining seminar presented by Dr. Carson at the ASCP CAMA (Commission on Associated Members Activities) Regional Program. I was already a member of the ASCP Associated Members Section. The seminar was Color Me Right:  A Seminar in Staining, November 19, 1983, at the ASCP Education Center in Chicago. The registration letter further stated that “we hope this workshop will be an informative and interesting experience.” When I talked with Dr. Carson at the seminar, she told me to call her “Freida.” This was my beginning to see that she was a humble person.     

     
As time progressed, I remembered Gerre told me earlier how Freida wanted techs to get involved, so in 1983 I joined NSH and began to try to get involved. I presented my first NSH Convention workshop in Little Rock, AR. I learned about the NSH, the Board of Directors, and Society governance. Freida was the Speaker of the House of Delegates and was stepping down from this position at this NSH Convention. I talked to her about this position as I was interested, and she was encouraging. I ran for the Speaker of the House of Delegates 2 years later in 1988 and won. 

   
 I also saw another quality in Freida in 1991: compassion and sympathy. My first wife had died of cancer in August 1991, and the NSH Convention was held in Orlando, FL in September the same year. When I attendedFreida ran up to me, and I still remember her telling me, “Oh Lamar, I am so sorry”!
    
Over time, I remembered Freida’s encouragement, and I ran for NSH Vice President. And Freida was the President of NSH, and what an excellent opportunity to serve as Vice President under Freida as President. More opportunities to learn from Freida!

    
I never had the opportunity to present a workshop with Frieda, but we attended similar state Histology meetings and presented lectures and workshops at the meetings for several years. Freida’s love and desire to educate histotechs continued to inspire me. 

   
 Yet another humble moment that I saw in Frieda was when she was preparing and writing her first Histotechnology textbook.   At one of the ASCP grading sessions, along with Freida and others, she had brought some printing galleys for her book, and we reviewed them. She humbly asked us, “do you think that I can do this?”  In 1990 she published her first book: Histotechnology A Self-Instructional Text, and preceded forward to publish four more books making a total of five textbooks!

    
Freida was a lady who consistently offered opportunities to techs, and she offered me a few in my career. One opportunity that I specifically recall was a couple of small contributions to her first textbook. She needed a few images of special stains that she did not have at the time, and she asked if I had these specific images, which I did, and I contributed the images. They appeared in at least three of her books. She also included some artifacts in her first book and asked if I had images of the “chrome artifact” similar to Denza Sheehan’s book. I did not have any chrome artifact images, so we tried to re-create the artifact independently, but we never could re-create it, so we decided it probably did not exist any longer. 

   
 One final quality that I learned about Freida was her down-home simplicity! I called her one day with an NSH Board question, and Margaret answered the telephone, “hold on a minute, Freida is mixing cornbread”! When Freida answered the telephone, she said, “I love cornbread”!
     
Freida’s contributions to the field of Histotechnology were many – five (5) textbooks, ASCP staining videos, technical publications, ASCP study guides, Kodachrome slide sets, flashcards, workbooks, serving as NSH president, NSH Education Committee Chair, workshop and lecture presenter in local, national and foreign societies and many more!
     
So my list of communications and conversations with Freida could continue, but I will close with these thoughts. I am so happy that I met Freida early in my career. I admired and respected her from the first time I met her. She was a very knowledgeable but caring, humble person. She exhibited some unique qualities – encouragement, simplicity, offered opportunities, inspiration, to name a few. And she had a gift of humor that few witnessed! I credit my many mentors for my career, and Freida was one of them! But the one quality that I will never forget from Freida was – “get involved with your profession”!

 If you’d like to listen to Freida talk about her career, please visit our Histotech of the Decade podcast that aired in June 2020 


Written by M. Lamar Jones, BS, HTL(ASCP)


#2022
#Blog
#MemberStories
6 comments
98 views

Permalink

Comments

01-17-2022 10:01

Sharing Memories in writing isn’t that easy 

During my training as a Histotechnician, the other person that was to be in my training class had to drop out after the first week because she was allergic to formalin. This meant that I had 1 on 1 lectures with Dr. Carson and had to perform all training projects solo.  At the time, of course, I did understand how lucky I was to have 1 on 1 time with her. 

 

She taught us how to multi-task.  I can remember many years ago making Harris Hematoxylin from scratch.  Watching the reagent while it was on the hot plate, waiting for it to come to a boil so that I could add the mercuric oxide.  She walked behind me and said, “A watched pot never boils”.  This was her way of saying, “Find something else to do while you wait”.

 

I can remember that when the hospital I worked at years ago sent me to Australia to work with Professor Leong, Freida started calling me her “Little International Histotech”.  I was far from little and not that young.

 

Our mothers and fathers teach us how to walk and talk, Freida was my educational mother, she gave me a life skill that became more than a job, more than a profession, she gave me a passion for Histology.  Now she is my Histology Angel.

01-15-2022 17:22

Like others I was in awe of Frieda's career and her involvement. I had met her in passing a few times at NSH meetings but she apparently kept tabs on people for future needs. I had been giving a workshop on cost accounting for histology labs at various State and NSH meetings and at one meeting she came up to me, grabbed me by the arm and said "I need you to make a cost account of buying verses making formalin for a lab I am working with." Of course I could not refuse so I made one up and sent it to her.

She had been there my whole career - literally - and and it seemed like she would be there forever. I cannot imagine how many people it will take to fill her shoes!

01-15-2022 01:44

Even though the Loss of Dr. Frieda Carson is a tragedy to all of us, we have to pledge at this moment to keep her legacy and follow the edition of her Golden Text Book, lecturing and motivation!! 
George

01-14-2022 20:49

Ms. Freida was and always be my histology idol.  Early in my career she worked right alongside me via her text.  I owe my love of this career to her.  She was so passionate about our profession and instilled in passion in all of us.  Freida's legacy lives in each of us.

01-14-2022 15:05

For over 25 years I have referred to her as the High Priestess of Histology. She was an invaluable asset to the field and will be missed.

01-14-2022 15:02

This is a message to Freida, but I hope in my heart that she already knows exactly how I feel.

Sometime around the late 1960s, I placed you on my mind’s pedestal with some of the other pioneers in our field, like Lee Luna, Ann Preece, Dezna Sheehan. It wasn’t until several years later that I realized that you were as wonderful a person as you were a professional. After a long day of learning at an NSH meeting, several of us went to the hotel bar and grill. You walked in alone and we asked if you would like to join us. While we waited for dinner, we enjoyed a drink and snacked on peanuts. I was amazed (and thrilled) that you would enjoy a good chat, have lots of laughs, and throw peanut shells on the floor just like everyone else. That evening started our long and enduring friendship.

You taught me so much about histology, of course, but also about how to live a great life.  You were constantly, and probably unknowingly, setting examples.  You were always sharing your knowledge, and thinking toward the future to prepare for changes and improvements within our field.  You set goals, worked to accomplish them and met deadlines.  Most importantly, you brought others along so they could learn from you and improve themselves because of your input and guidance.  On the personal side, you knew when to relax and enjoy the pleasures of life and to love, value, and share the things that were important and made you happy. I admired you even more after witnessing your fortitude when you had to rebuild your life after the fire, strength as you faced the challenges of your disease, and courage and careful planning for the end of your life. I hope that you are resting in peace knowing full well how much of a positive impact you made on so many people, both personally and professionally.  You are still on my "Freida pedestal" but Ron and I are blessed to be able to call you a dear friend who we will love and miss forever.

 Jan Minshew