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CROSSWORD SETTER: Todd Gross & Andrea Carla Michaels
THEME: They Move Faster and Faster … each of today’s themed answers ends with something that moves at a certain pace, and that pace increases as we progress through the grid:
17A. Bot that systematically browses the Internet : WEB CRAWLER
28A. “The Color Purple” novelist : ALICE WALKER
48A. 1982 Harrison Ford sci-fi film : BLADE RUNNER
64A. Classic red wagon : RADIO FLYER
BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 5m 03s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0
Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
10. Sig Ep, e.g. : FRAT
The Sigma Phi Epsilon fraternity was founded in 1901 in Richmond, Virginia and is sometimes known as “SigEp”.
14. Jane Austen novel : EMMA
I listened to one of my favorite Jane Austen novels on Audio Book not so long ago. “Emma” is the tale of Emma Woodhouse and the wonderful George Knightley. At the end of the story, Emma marries Knightley and her young friend Harriet marries Robert Martin, who had been trying to get Harriet’s attention practically from page one of the novel!
15. Capital on the Nile : CAIRO
Cairo is the capital city of Egypt. It is the largest city on the continent of Africa and is nicknamed “The City of a Thousand Minarets” because of its impressive skyline replete with Islamic architecture. The name “Cairo” is a European corruption of the city’s original name in Arabic, “Al-Qahira”, which translates as “the Vanquisher” or “the Conqueror”.
16. ___ Strauss & Co. (jeans maker) : LEVI
Levi Strauss was the founder of the first company in the world to manufacture blue jeans. Levi Strauss & Co. opened in 1853 in San Francisco. Strauss and his business partner were awarded a patent in 1873 for the use of copper rivets to strengthen points of strain on working pants.
17. Bot that systematically browses the Internet : WEB CRAWLER
A bot is computer program that is designed to imitate human behavior. It might “crawl” around the Web doing searches for example, or it might participate in discussions in chat rooms by giving pre-programmed responses.
20. Bullet that leaves a trail : TRACER
Tracer ammunition has a small chemical charge at the base that leaves a bright, smoky trail so that path of the bullet or projectile is visible. This allows the shooter correct his or her aim more easily.
23. Language of the Quran : ARABIC
The Koran is also known as the Qur’an in English, a transliteration of the Arabic name for the holy text of the Muslim faith. The literal translation of “Koran” is “the recitation”.
26. Billiard stick : CUE
The more correct name for the game of pool is pocket billiards. The name “pool” arose after pocket billiards became a common feature in “pool halls”, places where gamblers “pooled” their money to bet on horse races.
27. “I have a dream” monogram : MLK
I remember listening to the full text of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr’s “I have a dream …” speech not long after I moved to this country. I think I am man enough to admit that my eyes misted up as I listened to the words. I also recall thinking how lucky I was to have been invited to live in this great country, which was facing up to some of the sins of its past.
I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
28. “The Color Purple” novelist : ALICE WALKER
Alice Walker is an author and poet. Walker’s best known work is the novel “The Color Purple”, which earned her the National Book Award and the Pulitzer Prize. “The Color Purple” was of course adapted into a very successful film of the same name, directed by Steven Spielberg.
31. Words from Wordsworth : ODES
The great English poet William Wordsworth is intrinsically linked with the Lake District in the north of England, where he lived from much of his life. The Lake District is a beautiful part of the country, and I’ve been fortunate enough to visit Dove Cottage in Grasmere a couple of times, where Wordsworth lived with his wife Dorothy …
34. Austin Powers, e.g. : SPY
The character of Austin Powers was created by the actor who plays him, namely Mike Myers. Apparently Myers came up with the idea for Powers while listening to the Burt Bacharach song “The Look of Love”.
35. Precursor of Windows : MS-DOS
MS-DOS (short for Microsoft Disk Operating System) was the main operating system used by IBM-compatible PCs in the eighties and for much of the nineties.
39. Radisson or Ritz-Carlton : HOTEL
The first Radisson hotel opened in 1909 in Minneapolis. The hotel name was chosen in honor of the 17th-century French explorer Pierre-Esprit Radisson.
César Ritz was a Swiss hotelier, who had a reputation for developing the most luxurious of accommodations and attracting the wealthiest clientèle. He opened the Hotel Ritz in Paris in 1898 and the second of his most famous hotels, the Ritz Hotel in London, in 1906. Ritz was lucky in his career, as before starting his own hotel chain he had been dismissed from the Savoy Hotel in London, implicated in the disappearance of a substantial amount of wine and spirits. Today’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company was founded in 1983, although the chain has its roots in the properties developed by César Ritz.
47. Archibald or Thurmond of the N.B.A. : NATE
Nate Archibald is a retired basketball player who played mainly for the Kansas City Kings and the Boston Celtics. Archibald could get the ball in the basket, but was also willing pass to a teammate when advantageous. He is only player to lead the league in assists and scoring in the same season.
Nate Thurmond is a retired basketball player who was known to fans as “Nate the Great”.
48. 1982 Harrison Ford sci-fi film : BLADE RUNNER
“Blade Runner” is a cult classic, a sci-fi film made in 1982 loosely based on the novel “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?” by Philip K. Dick. It was directed by Ridley Scott who regards “Blade Runner” as his most “complete” film. There is a phenomenon known as the “‘Blade Runner’ Curse”. An inordinate number of companies behind products that were displayed prominently in the movie found themselves in financial trouble soon after the movie’s release. Included in the list of troubled concerns are Atari, Cuisinart, Pan Am and the Bell System.
55. The “p” of m.p.h. : PER
Miles per hour (mph).
56. ___ l’oeil (literally, “deceives the eye”) : TROMPE
Trompe-l’oeil is a technique in art that creates the optical illusion that a drawn object exists in three dimensions. “Trompe-l’oeil” is French for “deceive the eye”.
58. The Lone Ranger, to Tonto : KEMOSABE
“Kemosabe” is a term used by the Tonto character in the iconic radio and television program “The Lone Ranger”. “Kemosabe” doesn’t really mean anything outside of the show, and in fact was written as “ke-mo sah-bee” in the original radio show scripts. The term was created by longtime director of “The Lone Ranger”, Jim Jewell. To come up with the term, Jewell used the name of a boy’s camp that his father-in-law established called Kamp Kee-Mo Sah-Bee.
63. Zest : ELAN
Our word “élan” was imported from French, in which language the word has a similar meaning to ours, i.e “style” or “flair”.
64. Classic red wagon : RADIO FLYER
Radio Flyer is the name of the toy company that produces the famous red wagon. The company’s founder was Antonio Pasin, and he named the steel wagon “Radio Flyer” simply because he was fascinated with radio and flight.
68. Architect Saarinen : EERO
Eero Saarinen was a Finnish American architect, renowned in this country for his unique designs for public buildings such as Gateway Arch in St. Louis, Dulles International Airport Terminal, and the TWA building at JFK. The list of his lesser-known, but still impressive, works includes several buildings erected on academic campuses. For example, the Chapel and Kresge Auditorium on the MIT campus, the Emma Hartman Noyes House at Vassar College, the Law School building at the University of Chicago, and Yale’s David S. Ingalls Rink.
70. Birds that fly in V’s : GEESE
Apparently geese fly in a V-formation for a couple of reasons. One is that it makes for efficient flight and conserves energy. The leading bird gets no advantage, but every following bird gets to “slipstream” a little. It has been noted that the lead bird drops to the back of the formation when it gets fatigued. It’s also thought that the flock can stick together more easily when in formation, so it is more difficult to lose someone along the way.
Down
1. Eye of ___ and toe of frog (ingredients in a witches’ brew) : NEWT
The witches in Shakespeare’s “Macbeth” have some lovely lines as they boil up and evil brew and cast a spell:
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn and cauldron bubble.Fillet of a fenny snake,
In the cauldron boil and bake;
Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder’s fork, and blind-worm’s sting,
Lizard’s leg, and howlet’s wing,–
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.
2. Green gems : EMERALDS
The mineral beryl is a source of a number of different, semi-precious stones, depending on the nature of the impurities present. Pure beryl is colorless; blue beryl is called aquamarine, and green beryl is emerald. The source of the green color is mainly chromium.
4. Capital of Bangladesh, old-style : DACCA
Dhaka (once “Dacca”) is the capital city of Bangladesh. Dhaka is known for many things, including production of the finest muslin in the world. It’s also the rickshaw capital of the world, with about 400,000 rickshaws running each day.
8. Graham who wrote “Our Man in Havana” : GREENE
“Our Man in Havana” is a marvelously entertaining novel by Graham Greene, first published in 1958. It’s all about a British vacuum cleaner salesman who lives in Havana, Cuba. The salesman is recruited by the British secret service, and then sends fake information to London, just to get paid. The novel was adapted into a fabulous film of the same name in 1959, starring Alec Guinness.
10. Chunk of ice in the Arctic Ocean : FLOE
An ice floe is a sheet of ice that has separated from an ice field and is floating freely on the ocean.
12. Park or Madison, in Manhattan : AVENUE
Park Avenue in New York City used to be known as Fourth Avenue, and for much of its length carried the tracks of the New York and Harlem Railroad. When the line was built, some of it was constructed by cutting through the length of the street and then forming underground tunnels by covering over the line with grates and greenery. This greenery formed a parkland between 34th and 40th Streets, and in 1860 the grassy section of Fourth Avenue was renamed Park Avenue, a name that was eventually used for the whole thoroughfare.
Madison Avenue became the center of advertising in the US in the twenties, and serves as the backdrop to the great TV drama “Mad Men”. There aren’t many advertising agencies left on Madison Avenue these days though, as most have moved to other parts of New York City. The street takes its name from Madison Square, which is bounded on one side by Madison Avenue. The square in turn takes its name from James Madison, the fourth President of the United States.
18. 2000s sitcom starring a country singer : REBA
Reba McEntire is a country music singer and television actress. McEntire starred in her own sitcom called “Reba” that aired on the WB and the CW cable channels from 2001 to 2007.
24. “See ya!” : CIAO!
“Ciao” is the Italian for “‘bye”. “Arrivederci” is more formal, and translates as “goodbye”.
29. Make butter the old-fashioned way : CHURN
Butter churns are devices that convert cream into butter. The churn agitates the cream mechanically, disrupting milk fat. Clumps of disrupted milk fat form larger and larger fat globules. Eventually, the mixture separates into solid butter and liquid buttermilk.
30. French city historically known for silk : LYON
The city of Lyon in France, is also known as “Lyons” in English.
32. Cry when an auctioneer brings down the gavel : SOLD
A gavel is a small hammer that is rapped on a table or desk to call a meeting to order, or perhaps to signify a sale at an auction.
40. Many an April 15 mailer : TAXPAYER
April 15th wasn’t always Tax Day in the US. The deadline for returns was March 1st from 1913-18, when it was moved to March 15th. Tax Day has been April 15th since 1955.
41. “Yadda, yadda, yadda” : ET CETERA
“The Yada Yada Yada” is actually the name of the 153rd episode of “Seinfeld”. Before “Seinfeld” made “yada yada yada” famous, we were more likely to hear the phrase “yadda yadda”, often used by comedian Lenny Bruce, for example.
42. Necklace of flowers : LEI
“Lei” is the Hawaiian word for “garland, wreath”, although in more general terms a “lei” is any series of objects strung together as an adornment for the body.
46. Wordy : VERBOSE
Someone described as “verbose” is said to use too many words. The term comes from the Latin “verbum” meaning “word”.
48. Makers of tortes and tarts : BAKERS
A torte is a type of cake made primarily with eggs, sugar and ground nuts (but no flour).
50. Spanish fleet of 1588 : ARMADA
The most famous Armada was the Spanish fleet that sailed against England in order to overthrow Queen Elizabeth I in 1588. It failed in its mission, partly due to bad weather encountered en route. Ironically, the English mounted a similar naval attack against Spain the following year, and it failed as well.
51. Polite and refined : URBANE
We use “urbane” today to mean something courteous or refined. Back in the 1500s the term was used in the same way that we now use “urban”. Those townsfolk thought they were more sophisticated than the countryfolk, and so the usage evolved.
52. Liesl’s love in “The Sound of Music” : ROLF
The von Trapps portrayed in the musical “The Sound of Music”, was a real family, as is well known. In the musical and film, the eldest daughter is “Liesl”, although in real life her name was Agathe. Agathe came with her family to the US in 1938, and operated a private kindergarten in Baltimore, Maryland for 35 years. Agathe passed away in 2010.
57. Brawl : MELEE
Our word “melee” comes from the French “mêlée”, and in both languages the word means “confused fight”.
59. Rare blood type, for short : O-NEG
In general, a person with type O-negative blood is a universal donor, meaning that his or her blood can be used for a transfusion into persons with any other blood type: A, B, AB or O, negative or positive (although there are other considerations). Also in general, a person with type AB-positive blood is a universal recipient, meaning that he or she can receive a transfusion of blood of any type: A, B, AB or O, negative or positive.
60. Brickell or Falco : EDIE
Edie Brickell is a singer-songwriter from Dallas, Texas. Brickell has been married to fellow singer Paul Simon since 1991.
The actress Edie Falco won three Emmy Awards for playing Carmela Soprano on HBO’s outstanding drama series called “The Sopranos”. Falco also won an Emmy in 2010 for playing the title role in “Nurse Jackie”.
62. B’way hit signs : SROS
Standing room only (SRO)
For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Requisite : NEED
5. Trudges (through) : SLOGS
10. Sig Ep, e.g. : FRAT
14. Jane Austen novel : EMMA
15. Capital on the Nile : CAIRO
16. ___ Strauss & Co. (jeans maker) : LEVI
17. Bot that systematically browses the Internet : WEB CRAWLER
19. Unwrap : OPEN
20. Bullet that leaves a trail : TRACER
21. To whom a private says “Sir, yes, sir!” : SERGEANT
23. Language of the Quran : ARABIC
25. Neither’s partner : NOR
26. Billiard stick : CUE
27. “I have a dream” monogram : MLK
28. “The Color Purple” novelist : ALICE WALKER
31. Words from Wordsworth : ODES
33. “Boo” follower, in a triumphant shout : YAH!
34. Austin Powers, e.g. : SPY
35. Precursor of Windows : MS-DOS
37. What three strikes make : OUT
39. Radisson or Ritz-Carlton : HOTEL
43. Grazing expanse : LEA
45. Excite, with “up” : REV
47. Archibald or Thurmond of the N.B.A. : NATE
48. 1982 Harrison Ford sci-fi film : BLADE RUNNER
53. 91, to Caesar : XCI
54. Beach ball filler : AIR
55. The “p” of m.p.h. : PER
56. ___ l’oeil (literally, “deceives the eye”) : TROMPE
58. The Lone Ranger, to Tonto : KEMOSABE
61. Sounds like a sheep : BLEATS
63. Zest : ELAN
64. Classic red wagon : RADIO FLYER
66. Was a passenger : RODE
67. College class hours : UNITS
68. Architect Saarinen : EERO
69. Giveaways at events : SWAG
70. Birds that fly in V’s : GEESE
71. Geologic time periods : ERAS
Down
1. Eye of ___ and toe of frog (ingredients in a witches’ brew) : NEWT
2. Green gems : EMERALDS
3. Started, as on a journey : EMBARKED
4. Capital of Bangladesh, old-style : DACCA
5. In a frightening way : SCARILY
6. Attorney-at-___ : LAW
7. Classical paintings : OILS
8. Graham who wrote “Our Man in Havana” : GREENE
9. Woes : SORROWS
10. Chunk of ice in the Arctic Ocean : FLOE
11. Prepare to go home from vacation, say : REPACK
12. Park or Madison, in Manhattan : AVENUE
13. Dye specialist : TINTER
18. 2000s sitcom starring a country singer : REBA
22. Math class drawing : GRAPH
24. “See ya!” : CIAO!
27. Word in a heart tattoo : MOM
29. Make butter the old-fashioned way : CHURN
30. French city historically known for silk : LYON
32. Cry when an auctioneer brings down the gavel : SOLD
36. Oozes : SEEPS
38. Circus structure : TENT
40. Many an April 15 mailer : TAXPAYER
41. “Yadda, yadda, yadda” : ET CETERA
42. Necklace of flowers : LEI
44. Carpet alternative : AREA RUG
46. Wordy : VERBOSE
48. Makers of tortes and tarts : BAKERS
49. Stay out of sight : LIE LOW
50. Spanish fleet of 1588 : ARMADA
51. Polite and refined : URBANE
52. Liesl’s love in “The Sound of Music” : ROLF
57. Brawl : MELEE
59. Rare blood type, for short : O-NEG
60. Brickell or Falco : EDIE
62. B’way hit signs : SROS
65. “___ all good” : IT’S
The Best of the New York Times Crossword Collections
Amazon.com Widgets
KEMOSABE derives from a phrase of the Ojibwa language, loosely translated as "he who looks out in secret" or "trusted friend." If you ever heard Jay Silverheels talk about Clayton Moore, he didn't think Moore was much of a friend.
Swag?
8:24, no errors. The ghettoization of the English language has given us words like 'bling' and 'swag', meaning valuables. What we used to call party favors are now sometimes called Swag Bags. It is reported that the Swag Bags given to the guests at the 2015 Oscar's were worth about $160,000 each.