0314-11: New York Times Crossword Answers 14 Mar 11, Monday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Grp. defending individual rights : ACLU
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has its roots in the First World War, when it was founded to provide legal advice and support to conscientious objectors.

5. WWW letters : HTML
HTML is HyperTest Markup Language, the language used to write most Internet web pages (including this one).

9. France’s ___ Antoinette : MARIE
Marie Antoinette was the wife of Louis XVI, the last king of France. She was the fifteenth of sixteen children born to the Empress Maria Theresa of Austria. The marriage to Louis, Marie Antoinette’s second cousin once removed, was arranged while the two were very young. The prospective bride was “handed over” to the French at a border crossing in 1770, and two weeks later she was married to the future king. Marie Antoinette was just 14 years of age, and Louis only a year her senior.

15. Buffalo’s county or lake : ERIE
Buffalo is the second most-populous city in the state of New York. The city takes its name from Buffalo Creek that runs though the metropolis (although it is called Buffalo River within the city). The source of the name Buffalo for the creek is the subject of much speculation, but one thing is clear, there were never any bison in the area.

16. Bikini Island, e.g. : ATOLL
The first test of a hydrogen bomb was in 1954 at Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. It may have been a technical success, but it was an environmental disaster, largely because the actual yield of 15 megatons was unexpected (the military anticipated only 4-6 megatons). The resulting nuclear fallout caused many deaths, and led to birth defects in generations to come.

17. Jamie Foxx’s “Yep ___ Me” : DAT’S
Jamie Foxx is indeed a very versatile entertainer. He is an Oscar-winning actor (for playing the title role in “Ray”), and a Grammy Award winning musician. He is also a stand-up comedian and a talk-radio host.

18. Fountain treat : MALTED MILK
Walgreens claims to have introduced the malted milkshake, in 1922.

20. Early Mexican : AZTEC
The Aztec people of Central America dominated the region in the 14th – 16th centuries. Two traits of the Aztec people are oft cited today. They built some magnificent pyramids, and they also engaged in human sacrifice. The two traits were linked in a way … for the consecration of the Great Pyramid of Tenochtitlan, 84,400 prisoners were sacrificed over a period of four days.

23. What M&M’s do : MELT IN ONE’S MOUTH
Forrest Mars, Sr. was the founder of the Mars Company. He invented the Mars Bar while living over in England, and then developed M&M’s when he returned to the US. He came up with the idea for M&M’s when he saw soldiers in the Spanish Civil War eating chocolate pellets. Those pellets had a hard shell of tempered chocolate on the outside to prevent them from melting. Mars got some of the funding to develop the M&M from William Murrie, the son of the president of Hershey’s Chocolate. It is the Ms from Mars and Murrie which give the name to the candy.

32. Singer Kitt : EARTHA
Eartha Kitt sure did have a unique voice and singing style. Her rendition of “Santa Baby” has to be one of the most distinctive and memorable recordings in the popular repertoire. Some of you will no doubt remember Eartha playing Cat Woman on the final series of the TV show “Batman”.

37. Company that produced Twister and Candy Land : MILTON BRADLEY
One of Eva Gabor’s claims to fame is the unwitting promotion of the game called “Twister”, the sales of which was languishing in 1996. In an appearance on “The Tonight Show” she got on all fours and played the game with Johnny Carson. Sales took off immediately, and Twister became a huge hit.

The Candy Land board game first went on the market in 1949, and in 2005 was named the most popular “toy” of the whole 1940s decade.

42. Libra’s symbol : SCALES
The constellation of Libra is named for the scales held by the goddess of justice, and is the only sign of the zodiac that isn’t named for a living creature.

46. Basketball rim attachment : NET
Basketball truly is an American sport. It was created in 1891 by a James Naismith at the YMCA in Springfield, Massachusetts. His goal was to create something active and interesting for his students in the gym. The first “hoops” were actually peach baskets, with the bottoms of the baskets intact. When you got that ball in the “net”, you had to clamber up and get it back out again to continue the game!

50. Hershey’s vatful : MOLTEN CHOCOLATE
Milton Hershey used profits from the sale of his successful Lancaster Caramel Company to construct a chocolate plant in his hometown of Derry Church, Pennsylvania. He started building the factory in 1903, and by 1906 his chocolate was so successful Derry Church changed its name to Hershey, Pennsylvania.

54. Indy 500, e.g. : RACE
The first Indy 500 race was held on Memorial Day in 1911. The winner that day was one Ray Harroun. He had seen someone using a rear view mirror on a horse-drawn vehicle, and decided to fit one on his Marmon “Wasp” motor car. Supposedly that was the first ever use of a rear view mirror on a motor vehicle.

55. Antianxiety drug with a palindromic name : XANAX
Xanax is a brand name of the antianxiety drug alprazolam. Xanax is one of the most commonly misused prescription drugs in the US, with wide acceptance in the illegal recreational drug market.

62. “___ Ha’i” (“South Pacific” song) : BALI
The song “Bali Ha’i” is from the musical “South Pacific” by Rodgers and Hammerstein. In the musical, Bali Ha’i is the name of a volcanic island that neighbors the island on which the story takes place.

63. “Ran” director Kurosawa : AKIRA
Akira Kurosawa was an Oscar-winning Japanese film director. His most famous movie to us in the West has to be “The Seven Samurai”, the inspiration for the “The Magnificent Seven” starring Yul Brynner, and indeed a basis for “Star Wars: The Clone Wars”.

65. Yale students : ELIS
Eli is the nickname for a graduate of Yale University, a term used in honor of the Yale benefactor Elihu Yale.

68. Exam for a wannabe atty. : LSAT
The Law School Admission Test has been around since 1948.

Down
1. Gomez or Morticia : ADDAMS
Chas Addams was a cartoonist. He didn’t draw a cartoon strip, but rather individual cartoons, although many of his cartoons did feature regular characters. His most famous characters were the members of the Addams Family, who were published in single-panel cartoons between 1938 and 1988 in “The New Yorker”. The Addams Family moved onto the small and big screens starting in 1964.

7. “The Last Supper” city : MILAN
Leonardo da Vinci’s famous mural “The Last Supper” can be seen on an end wall of the dining hall in the monastery of Santa Maris delle Grazie in Milan, Italy. If you want to see it in person, you have to make a reservation ahead of time, and once you get there, you’re only allowed 15 minutes viewing time. It’s very popular …

9. Puccini’s “___ Butterfly” : MADAMA
Puccini’s “Madama Butterfly” is the most-performed opera in the US. The opera we see today is actually the second version that Puccini produced. The original version was first staged in 1904 at La Scala in Milan where it received a very poor reception. Puccini reworked the piece, breaking the second act into two new acts and making some other significant changes. The opera was relaunched a few months later, and was a resounding success.

11. Louis XIV, par exemple : ROI
Louis XIV is perhaps the most famous of the kings (“rois”) of France, and was known as the “Sun King” (le Roi Soleil”). Louis XIV was king from 1638 to 1715, a reign of over 72 years, the longest reign of any European monarch.

12. “___ Never Fall in Love Again” : I’LL
“I’ll Never Fall in Love Again” is a song written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David for the musical “Promises, Promises” based on the great 1960 movie “The Apartment”. I think most people in the US associate the song with Dionne Warwick for whom it was a big hit, but on the other side of the Atlantic we are more familiar with the Bobby Gentry version as she has a number one with it in 1969.

13. Antlered animal : ELK
The elk (also known as the wapiti) is the one of the largest species of deer in the world, with only the moose being bigger. Early European settlers were used to seeing the smaller red deer back in their homelands, so when they saw the “huge” wapiti they assumed it was a moose, and gave it the European name for a moose, namely “elk”. The more correct term then is “wapiti”, the Shawnee name for the animal, which means “white rump”. It’s all very confusing …

21. Spotted cat : CIVET
The civet is a spotted cat that is native to Africa and Asia. There is a type of coffee that is highly prized in Vietnam and the Philippines that is made from coffee beans that have been eaten by civets, partially digested and then harvested from the civet’s feces. This civet coffee can cost about $100 a cup, if you want to try some …

24. Area west of the Bowery : NOHO
NoHo is short for North of Houston (street), and is the equivalent area to SoHo, South of Houston, both in New York City.

25. Actors Ken and Lena : OLINS
Ken Olin was one of the stars on the hit television series “Thirtysomething”, playing Michael Steadman. After “Thirtysomething”, he moved behind the camera and is now a producer and director.

Lena Olin is a Swedish actress, discovered by Ingmar Bergman. Her most famous performance was in “Chocolat” released in 2000, and then she won an Emmy in 2003 for Best Supporting actress in the TV show “Alias”.

27. ___ Reader (eclectic bimonthly) : UTNE
The “Utne Reader” is known for aggregation and republishing of articles on politics, culture and the environment from other sources in the media. It was founded in 1984, with “Utne” being the family name of the couple that started the publication.

28. Place to swim and play b-ball, say : THE Y
The YMCA is a worldwide movement that has its roots in London, England. There, in 1844, the Young Men’s Christian Association was founded with the intent of promoting Christian principles through the development of “a healthy spirit, mind and body”. The founder, George Williams, saw the need to create YMCA facilities for young men who were flocking to the cities as the Industrial Revolution flourished. He saw that these men were frequenting taverns and brothels, and wanted to offer a more wholesome alternative.

34. “30 Rock” network : NBC
“30 Rock” is Tina Fey’s own creation, and tells the behind-the-scenes story of a live sketch show not dissimilar to Saturday Night Live (where Fey first achieved celebrity). “30 Rock” is the address of the NBC studios, located at 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York City. I was shocked to read that Tina Fey has a scar on her face, a few inches long on her left cheek, the result of a childhood “slashing” incident. When she was just five years old, playing in the front yard of her house, someone just came up to her and slashed her with a knife. How despicable!

35. Liquid-Plumr rival : DRANO
To clean out drains we might buy Crystal Drano which is sodium hydroxide (lye) mixed with sodium nitrate, sodium chloride (table salt) and aluminum. The contents of Drano work in concert to clear the clog. The lye reacts with any fats creating soap which may be enough to break up the clog. Also, the finely divided aluminum reacts with water creating tremendous heat so that the mixture boils and churns, then any hair or fibers are cut by the sharp edges of the nitrate and chloride crystals. Having said all that, I find that boiling water poured down the drain almost always does the job …

38. The “I” in IHOP: Abbr. : INTL
The International House of Pancakes was founded back in 1958. IHOP was originally intended to be called IHOE, the International House of Eggs, but that name didn’t do well in marketing tests …

39. “30 Rock” co-star Baldwin : ALEC
Alec is the oldest of the acting Baldwin brothers. I think his big break was playing Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan in “The Hunt for Red October”, but thank goodness that role was taken over by Harrison Ford for the subsequent Jack Ryan movies. Baldwin is making a name for himself these days playing Jack Donaghy on “30 Rock”, opposite Tina Fey.

45. Crackle and pop’s partner : SNAP
The three elves Snap, Crackle and Pop are the mascots for Kellogg’s Rice Krispies. They first appeared in an ad campaign in 1933, although the phrase “snap, crackle and pop” had been used for the cereal before then in a radio ads. By the way, the elves are selling “Rice Bubbles” in Australia, and the elves have different names in other parts of the world (like “Cric!, Crac! and Croc! in Quebec).

48. Home of Venezia : ITALIA
Venezia (Venice) is in Italia (Italy).

49. Like male chauvinists : SEXIST
Nicolas Chauvin was supposedly a French soldier who exhibited fierce loyalty for France despite being wounded 17 times in the service of his country and being left severely disfigured and maimed. The name Chauvin went into the French language, and ultimately into English, as “chauvinism”, a term describing exaggerated and blind patriotism. Today “chauvinism” is often used interchangeably with the expression “male chauvinism”, the belief that men are superior to women.

51. Musical staff sign : C-CLEF
Clef is the French word for “key”. In music, a clef is used to indicate the pitch of the notes written on the stave.

52. Supermodel Klum : HEIDI
German-born Heidi Klum is married to the successful English singer, Seal. She is a talented lady and has built a multi-faceted career based on her early success as a model. She is the force behind the Bravo reality show called “Project Runway” that has been on the air since 2004. Klum has been nominated for an Emmy for the show 4-5 times.

56. Alfred E. Neuman’s magazine : MAD
Alfred E. Neuman is the mascot of “Mad” magazine, although the image of the smiling, jug-eared youth had been around for decades before the magazine. “Mad” first used the likeness in 1955, and young Mr. Neuman has appeared on the cover of almost every issue of the magazine since then. Neuman’s name was inspired by American composer Alfred Newman, a prolific writer of film scores.

57. “Tip-Toe Thru’ the Tulips With Me” instrument : UKE
Tiny Tim was the stage name of American singer and ukulele player Herbert Khaury. His most famous recording by far was his novelty version of the 1926 song “Tip-Toe Thru’ the Tulips”.

58. Actress Tyler of “Armageddon” : LIV
Actress and model Liv Tyler is the daughter of Steven Tyler, lead singer with Aerosmith, and Bebe Buell, the model and singer.

60. “Which came first?” choice : EGG
I say it was the chicken …

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Grp. defending individual rights : ACLU
5. WWW letters : HTML
9. France’s ___ Antoinette : MARIE
14. What icicles do : DRIP
15. Buffalo’s county or lake : ERIE
16. Bikini Island, e.g. : ATOLL
17. Jamie Foxx’s “Yep ___ Me” : DAT’S
18. Fountain treat : MALTED MILK
20. Early Mexican : AZTEC
22. Simple rhyme scheme : ABAA
23. What M&M’s do : MELT IN ONE’S MOUTH
30. Opposite of NNW : SSE
31. W-Z, e.g., in an encyc. : VOL
32. Singer Kitt : EARTHA
33. Lagging : BEHIND
36. All over again : ANEW
37. Company that produced Twister and Candy Land : MILTON BRADLEY
41. Restaurant handout : MENU
42. Libra’s symbol : SCALES
43. Extremists : ULTRAS
46. Basketball rim attachment : NET
47. “___ for Cookie” (“Sesame Street” song) : C IS
50. Hershey’s vatful : MOLTEN CHOCOLATE
54. Indy 500, e.g. : RACE
55. Antianxiety drug with a palindromic name : XANAX
56. The “3” in “6 x 3 = 18” : MULTIPLIER
62. “___ Ha’i” (“South Pacific” song) : BALI
63. “Ran” director Kurosawa : AKIRA
64. Rim : EDGE
65. Yale students : ELIS
66. Hell of a guy? : DEVIL
67. Mediterranean fruit trees : FIGS
68. Exam for a wannabe atty. : LSAT

Down
1. Gomez or Morticia : ADDAMS
2. Manias : CRAZES
3. Wee : LITTLE
4. Overturn : UPSET
5. ___ and 29-Down (hesitate) : HEM
6. La la lead-in : TRA
7. “The Last Supper” city : MILAN
8. Do not disturb : LET BE
9. Puccini’s “___ Butterfly” : MADAMA
10. 24-hr. banking convenience : ATM
11. Louis XIV, par exemple : ROI
12. “___ Never Fall in Love Again” : I’LL
13. Antlered animal : ELK
19. Comfort : EASE
21. Spotted cat : CIVET
24. Area west of the Bowery : NOHO
25. Actors Ken and Lena : OLINS
26. Ph.D. exams : ORALS
27. ___ Reader (eclectic bimonthly) : UTNE
28. Place to swim and play b-ball, say : THE Y
29. 5-Down and ___ (hesitate) : HAW
33. Say impulsively : BLURT
34. “30 Rock” network : NBC
35. Liquid-Plumr rival : DRANO
37. Prefix with drama : MELO-
38. The “I” in IHOP: Abbr. : INTL
39. “30 Rock” co-star Baldwin : ALEC
40. Program for getting clean : DETOX
41. Not saying a thing : MUM
44. Pre-cable TV adjunct : AERIAL
45. Crackle and pop’s partner : SNAP
47. Venice attractions : CANALS
48. Home of Venezia : ITALIA
49. Like male chauvinists : SEXIST
51. Musical staff sign : C-CLEF
52. Supermodel Klum : HEIDI
53. File folder stick-on : LABEL
56. Alfred E. Neuman’s magazine : MAD
57. “Tip-Toe Thru’ the Tulips With Me” instrument : UKE
58. Actress Tyler of “Armageddon” : LIV
59. Cycle starter? : TRI-
60. “Which came first?” choice : EGG
61. Home phone number abbr. : RES

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