In the course of our investigations of fluorenyl substituted m-xylylenes, substantial amounts of 3, 6-di-(tert-butyl) fluorenone were required. An obvious route is via the corresponding 3, 6-di-(rertbuty1) fluorene. Unfortunately electrophilic substitution of fluorene occurs at 2-and 7- positions rather than the 3-and 6-positions. This led Kajigaeshi and coworkers' to synthesize the title compound from