0730-13 New York Times Crossword Answers 30 Jul 13, Tuesday

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CROSSWORD SETTER: Peter A. Collins
THEME: Top 5 Hits … today’s themed answers are the titles of the top 5 greatest songs of all time as determined by “Rolling Stone” magazine, and what a fine collection of five songs it is:

18A. Honor … and #5 on a list by 40-/46-Across of the 500 greatest songs of all time : RESPECT
22A. Fulfillment … and #2 on the list : SATISFACTION
34A. With 40- and 46-Across, mossless? … and #1 on the list : LIKE A
40A. See 34-Across : ROLLING
46A. See 34-Across : STONE
54A. Casual greeting … and #4 on the list : WHAT’S GOING ON
61A. Pretend … and #3 on the list : IMAGINE

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 10m 20s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 2 … JAG (jug!), ABE (Ube!)

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

1. Upholstery materials : DAMASKS
Damask was originally a weaving technique associated with the Byzantine and Islamic weaving centers of the Middle Ages. “Damask” comes from the name of Damascus which was a major trading city at that time.

8. Caddy alternative : JAG
Jaguar started out as a manufacturer of sidecars for motorcycles back in 1922, when the company was known as the Swallow Sidecar Company (SS for short). The company changed its name to Jaguar after WWII, because of the unfortunate connotations of the letters “SS” at that time.

The Cadillac Automobile Company was founded in 1902, as an independent company. It was taken over by GM in 1909, and over the next thirty years GM did a great job establishing Cadillac as the luxury car one just had to own.

11. Great Leap Forward leader : MAO
Mao Zedong was born on December 16, 1893 in the Hunan Province of China. As Mao was the son of a peasant farmer, his prospects for education were limited. Indeed he left school at age 13 to work on the family farm but did eventually get to secondary school in Changsha, the provincial capital. In the years following, Mao continued his education in Beijing and actually turned down an opportunity to study in France.

“The Great Leap Forward” was the name given to the government-led campaign to transition China from an agrarian society to a modern communist society in the late fifties and early sixties.

18. Honor … and #5 on a list by 40-/46-Across of the 500 greatest songs of all time : RESPECT
“Respect” is a song by Otis Redding, and one that he recorded himself in 1965. It became a hit when Aretha Franklin made her famous cover version in 1967. Having said that, the Redding and Franklin versions do have different storylines and musical “feels”.

19. Frozen product with blueberry and chocolate chip flavors : EGGO
Eggo is the brand name of a line of frozen waffles made by Kellogg’s. When they were introduced in the 1930s, the name “Eggo” was chosen to promote the “egginess” of the batter. “Eggo” replaced the original name chosen, which was “Froffles”, created by melding “frozen” and “waffles”.

21. Give a dime on the dollar : TITHE
A tithe is a traditional payment of one tenth of a person’s annual income and is usually given to a church. Tithing is a practice taught in many traditions, and according to a 2002 survey, about 3% of American adults donate 10% or more of their income to a church.

22. Fulfillment … and #2 on the list : SATISFACTION
“(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” is a song recorded in 1965 that was a monumental hit for the Rolling Stones. The song was the first number-one hit in the US for the Stones, but back in their homeland of the UK the song had limited airtime as the lyrics were considered too sexually suggestive. The guitar riff at the beginning of “Satisfaction” has to be one of the most recognizable riffs of all time …

28. Gem of a girl? : OPAL
97% of the world’s opals come from Australia, so it’s no surprise perhaps that the opal is the national gemstone of the country. The state of South Australia provides the bulk of the world’s production, about 80%.

29. Belly ache? : ULCER
Until fairly recently, a peptic ulcer was believed to be caused by undue amounts of stress in one’s life. It is now known that 70-90% of all peptic ulcers are in fact associated with a particular bacterium.

34. With 40- and 46-Across, mossless? … and #1 on the list : LIKE A
(40. See 34-Across : ROLLING
46. See 34-Across : STONE)
“Like a Rolling Stone” is a hit written and recorded by Bob Dylan in 1965. “How does it feel …?”

36. River to the Caspian Sea : URAL
The Ural River rises in the Ural Mountains in Russia and flows for half its length through Russian territory until it crosses the border into Kazakhstan, finally emptying into the Caspian Sea.

38. Prohibition, for one : ERA
There were concerted efforts to ban the sale of alcoholic beverages in the US from the 1840s right up until the lobbyists achieved success with ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment to the US Constitution in 1919. While there were several factors that influenced legislators at that time, one was the perceived need to take political power away from German-based brewing industry during WWI.

39. Center of gravity? : VEE
The letter V (vee) is at the center of the word “gravity”.

43. Subdivision part : LOT
Our use of the word “lot” to describe a parcel of land dates back to the 1630s when ownership of the best property in new settlements was decided by castings “lots”.

44. Old French coin : ECU
The ecu was an Old French coin. When introduced in 1640, the ecu was worth three livres (an older coin, called a “pound” in English). The word “ecu” comes from the Latin “scutum” meaning “shield”. The original ecu had a coat of arms on it, a shield.

45. One who says “loo” instead of “john” : BRIT
When I was growing up in Ireland, a “bathroom” was a room that had a bath and no toilet. The separate room with the commode was called “the toilet” or sometimes the W.C. (the water closet). Apparently the term closet was used because in the 1800s when homeowners started installing toilets indoors they often displaced clothes and linens in a “closet”, as a closet was the right size to take the commode. It has been suggested that the British term “loo” comes from Waterloo (water-closet … water-loo), but no one seems to know for sure. Another suggestion is that the term comes from the card game of “lanterloo” in which the pot was called the loo!

The use of “john” as a slang term for a toilet is peculiar to North America. “John” probably comes from the older slang term of “jack” or “jakes” that had been around since the 16th century. In Ireland, in cruder moments, we still refer to a toilet as “the jacks”.

50. Advertisers’ awards : CLIOS
The Clio Awards are the Oscars of the advertising world and are named after Clio, the Greek Muse of History. Clio was also the recorder of great deeds, the proclaimer and celebrator of great accomplishments and a source of inspiration and genius. The Clio Awards were first presented in 1959.

54. Casual greeting … and #4 on the list : WHAT’S GOING ON
“What’s Going On” is a 1971 hit recorded by Marvin Gaye. The song was inspired by an incident witnessed by one of the writers, Obie Benson of the Four Tops. Benson was present when police responded brutally to an anti-war protest in People’s Park in Berkeley in 1969.

57. Kind of knife : BOWIE
A Bowie knife is a fixed-blade knife that was made famous by Colonel Jim Bowie in the early 1800s. A Bowie knife is one that comes with a sheath and has a crossguard at the end of the hilt. It also has a clip point, meaning that the forward third of the blade appears to be “clipped off”,leaving a sharp point.

61. Pretend … and #3 on the list : IMAGINE
John Lennon’s magnus opus is his song “Imagine”, released in 1971. “Imagine” was quite successful at the time of its release, but sadly, it only became a number one hit when Lennon was murdered in 1980. According to Lennon, the message behind the song is very simple: a world without countries or religion would be a peaceful place.

70. Site of the Missouri State Fair : SEDALIA
Sedalia, Missouri is a city in the center of the state, located about 30 miles south of the Missouri River. Sedalia is home to the Missouri State Fair, and is also home to the Scott Joplin Ragtime Festival. Joplin lived in Sedalia from 1894 to 1907, and worked in the Maple Leaf Club, after which he named his famous composition “Maple Leaf Rag”. Back in 2011, Sedalia was in the news when it was hit by a devastating tornado.

71. Dr. for the neck up : ENT
Ear, Nose and Throat specialist (ENT)

72. Place to get off: Abbr. : STA
Station (Sta.)

Down
3. Debussy’s “La ___” : MER
“La Mer” is a lovely group of three symphonic sketches for orchestra by the French composer Claude Debussy. Listen to it, and you can feel yourself at the ocean. “La Mer” is French for “The Sea”.

4. Torso muscles, for short : ABS
“Torso” (plural “torsi”) is an Italian word meaning the “trunk of a statue”, a word that we imported into English.

5. Gin berries : SLOES
The sloe is the fruit of the blackthorn bush.

6. Martial art : KUNG FU
In the west we sometimes use the term kung fu to mean a particular Chinese martial art. We’ve gotten the wrong idea though as the term “kung fu” really describes any skill that can be learned through dedication and hard work. So, kung fu can indeed describe a martial art, but by no means exclusively.

7. Martial arts actor Steven : SEAGAL
Steven Seagal is known in the U as a martial artist turned actor. Seagal started his career as an Aikido instructor in Japan and was the first foreigner to operate an Aikido dojo in that country.

9. Actor Vigoda : ABE
Abe Vigoda played Detective Sergeant Phil Fish in television’s “Barney Miller” in the seventies, and even got his own spin-off show called “Fish”. On the big screen he played Sal Tessio in “The Godfather” and Grandpa Ubriacco in “Look Who’s Talking”.

11. Part of it might consist of dashes : MEET
There are often 100-meter dashes at an athletics meet.

25. Grosse ___, Mich. : ILE
Grosse Ile, Michigan is an island in the Detroit River, and the most populated island in the whole state. The name “Grosse Ile” comes from the French for “large island”.

26. Hatcher of Hollywood : TERI
Teri Hatcher’s most famous role these days is the Susan Mayer character in “Desperate Housewives”. I’ve never seen more than a few minutes of “Housewives” but I do know Teri Hatcher as a Bond girl, as she appeared in “Tomorrow Never Dies”.

27. Land on the Persian Gulf : IRAN
The Persian Gulf is in effect an inland sea although it technically is an offshoot of the Indian Ocean. The outlet from the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean is one of the most famous maritime “choke points” in the world: the Strait of Hormuz. About 20% of the world’s supply of petroleum passes through the Strait of Hormuz.

32. One going for the big bucks? : BRONCO
A “bronco” (also “bronc”) is a horse that is untamed. In Mexican Spanish “bronco” is a word for “horse”, and in the original Spanish “bronco” means “rough, rude”.

33. Glossy cloth : SATEEN
Sateen is a cotton fabric, with a weave that is “four over, one under” meaning that most of the threads come to the surface giving it a softer feel.

35. Wall St. trader : ARB
“Arb” is short for an arbitrageur, one who profits from the purchase of securities in one market and the subsequent sale in another, hence taking advantage of price discrepancies across markets.

37. Some N.F.L. blockers: Abbr. : LGS
Left Guards (LGs)

41. SeaWorld sight : ORCA
The taxonomic name for the killer whale is Orcinus orca. The use of the name “orca”, rather than “killer whale”, is becoming more and more common. The Latin word “Orcinus” means “belonging to Orcus”, with Orcus being the name for the Kingdom of the Dead.

51. Fiona in “Shrek,” e.g. : OGRESS
Princess Fiona is the love interest in the “Shrek” series of films.

Before “Shrek” was a successful movie franchise and Broadway musical, it was a children’s picture book called “Shrek!” authored and illustrated by William Steig. The title “Shrek!” came from the German/Yiddish word Schreck, meaning “fear” or “terror”.

52. Evening bash : SOIREE
“Soir” is the French word for “evening” and a “soirée” is an “evening party”. The French word “soirée” has an acute accent over the first “e”, but we tend to drop this when using the word in English.

56. 2010 releases from Apple : IPADS
The very exciting iPad isn’t Apple’s first foray into the world of tablet computing. Apple created great buzz by introducing the Newton MessagePad way back in 1993. This innovative machine was fraught with problems and really died a very slow death, finally being withdrawn from the market in 1998.

63. Org. with air and water standards : EPA
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was set up during the Nixon administration and began operation at the end of 1970.

65. Carrier to Oslo : SAS
SAS was formerly known as Scandinavian Airlines System and is the flag carrier of three countries: Denmark, Norway and Sweden.

66. New Haven scholar : ELI
Eli is the nickname for a graduate of Yale University, a term used in honor of the Yale benefactor Elihu Yale.

The city of New Haven, Connecticut was founded in 1638 by Puritan immigrants from England. New Haven is of course home to Yale University. The city also initiated the first public tree planting program in the country. The large elms included in the program led to New Haven being called “the Elm City”.

67. Vegas casino : RIO
The Rio casino in Las Vegas was opened in 1990, originally targeting the local population as it is located off the famous Strip where most of the tourists hang out. Famously, the Rio opened up the adults-only Sapphire Pool in 2008, a pay-to-enter (only men paid) topless pool club that featured music and dancers. A year later the Sapphire Pool was closed down after there were eleven arrests for drugs and prostitution offences during an undercover police operation.

68. ___ Pedro : SAN
“San Pedro” is Spanish for “Saint Peter”.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Upholstery materials : DAMASKS
8. Caddy alternative : JAG
11. Great Leap Forward leader : MAO
14. Pale eye shade : ICE BLUE
15. Candidates for rehab : ABUSERS
17. Who you appear to be : PERSONA
18. Honor … and #5 on a list by 40-/46-Across of the 500 greatest songs of all time : RESPECT
19. Frozen product with blueberry and chocolate chip flavors : EGGO
21. Give a dime on the dollar : TITHE
22. Fulfillment … and #2 on the list : SATISFACTION
28. Gem of a girl? : OPAL
29. Belly ache? : ULCER
30. Lessens : EBBS
34. With 40- and 46-Across, mossless? … and #1 on the list : LIKE A
36. River to the Caspian Sea : URAL
38. Prohibition, for one : ERA
39. Center of gravity? : VEE
40. See 34-Across : ROLLING
43. Subdivision part : LOT
44. Old French coin : ECU
45. One who says “loo” instead of “john” : BRIT
46. See 34-Across : STONE
48. University div. : DEPT
50. Advertisers’ awards : CLIOS
53. Almost never : ONCE
54. Casual greeting … and #4 on the list : WHAT’S GOING ON
57. Kind of knife : BOWIE
60. Excursion : TRIP
61. Pretend … and #3 on the list : IMAGINE
64. Things felt in a classroom? : ERASERS
69. Goes full tilt : LETS RIP
70. Site of the Missouri State Fair : SEDALIA
71. Dr. for the neck up : ENT
72. Place to get off: Abbr. : STA
73. Time spent with a psychiatrist : SESSION

Down
1. Quick swim : DIP
2. Best pitcher on the team : ACE
3. Debussy’s “La ___” : MER
4. Torso muscles, for short : ABS
5. Gin berries : SLOES
6. Martial art : KUNG FU
7. Martial arts actor Steven : SEAGAL
8. Honey container : JAR
9. Actor Vigoda : ABE
10. Vigor : GUSTO
11. Part of it might consist of dashes : MEET
12. Go up, as eyebrows : ARCH
13. Bone: Prefix : OSTE-
16. Chiropractor’s target : SPINE
20. Witch, e.g. : OCCULTIST
22. Puzzling no more : SOLVED
23. For one : APIECE
24. Start, as a hobby : TAKE UP
25. Grosse ___, Mich. : ILE
26. Hatcher of Hollywood : TERI
27. Land on the Persian Gulf : IRAN
31. Hold membership : BELONG
32. One going for the big bucks? : BRONCO
33. Glossy cloth : SATEEN
35. Wall St. trader : ARB
37. Some N.F.L. blockers: Abbr. : LGS
41. SeaWorld sight : ORCA
42. Pleasant accent : LILT
47. Heap : TON
49. Sticks in a nest : TWIGS
51. Fiona in “Shrek,” e.g. : OGRESS
52. Evening bash : SOIREE
55. Successors : HEIRS
56. 2010 releases from Apple : IPADS
57. Ill temper : BILE
58. Sign : OMEN
59. Word after 60-, 75- or 100- : WATT
62. Point to pick : NIT
63. Org. with air and water standards : EPA
65. Carrier to Oslo : SAS
66. New Haven scholar : ELI
67. Vegas casino : RIO
68. ___ Pedro : SAN

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