Brain Teaser - Stagger The Order Of The Results

This one has been stumping me for several days. I can run a query that
returns several different items from several different manufacturers,
each with a ranking score. Each manufacturer can have any number of
items:

Item_Name Manufacturer rank
Item 1 Manu_A 82
Item 2 Manu_A 65
Item 3 Manu_A 41
Item 4 Manu_B 32
Item 5 Manu_C 21
Item 6 Manu_B 19

However, I would like the records to be ordered so that the highest
ranking item is shown first, then the next highest item from a
different manufacturer is shown second, then the next highest item from
a third manufacturer is show, etc.:

Item 1 Manu_A 82
Item 4 Manu_B 32
Item 5 Manu_C 21
Item 2 Manu_A 65
Item 6 Manu_B 19
Item 3 Manu_A 41

Does anyone have any thoughts on how to order the results in this
fashion?

thanks,

Matt Weiner