0601-16 New York Times Crossword Answers 1 Jun 16, Wednesday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
7. Early 10th-century year : CMIX
CMIX = 909 in Roman numerals.

14. Dickinson with a modeling agency : JANICE
Janice Dickinson is one of several women sometimes described as the world’s first “supermodel”. Dickinson was at the height of her modeling career in the 1970s and 1980s. She regained national attention starting in 2003 when she became a judge of the reality TV show “America’s Next Top Model”.

17. Rock’s Blue ___ Cult : ÖYSTER
Blue Öyster Cult is a rock band from Long Island, New York. I may be alone in labeling Blue Öyster Cult as a “one-hit wonder”, but I always associate the band with the marvelous 1976 song “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper”.

18. Scott in 1857 news : DRED
Famously, the slave Dred Scott was unsuccessful in suing for his freedom in St. Louis, Missouri in 1857.

19. ___ de la Cité : ÎLE
There are two famous islands in the middle of the River Seine in Paris, one being the Île de la Cité, and the other Île Saint-Louis. Île de la Cité is the most renowned of the two, as it is home to the cathedral of Notre Dame.

20. Triple Crown stat : RBI
In baseball, a player can earn the Triple Crown when he is the leader in three specific statistics. The pitching Triple Crown includes wins, strikeouts and earned run average (ERA). The batting Triple Crown includes home runs, runs batted in (RBI) and batting average.

23. Orch. section : STR
Strings (str.)

24. Supreme Court justice who replaced Stevens : KAGAN
Elena Kagan was the Solicitor General of the United States who replaced Justice John Paul Stevens on the US Supreme Court. That made Justice Kagan the first female US Solicitor General and the fourth female US Supreme Court justice. I hear she is a fan of Jane Austen, and used to reread “Pride and Prejudice” once a year. Not a bad thing to do, I’d say …

John Paul Stevens retired as an associate justice on the US Supreme Court in 2010 after having served for over 34 years. That made him the third longest serving justice in the history of the court. Stevens had been nominated by President Gerald Ford to replace Justice William O. Douglas, who had been the longest serving justice in the court (at over 36 years).

26. U.N. agcy. that promotes “decent work for all women and men” : ILO
The ILO (International Labour Organization) is an agency now administered by the UN which was established by the League of Nations after WWI. The ILO deals with important issues such as health and safety, discrimination, child labor and forced labor. The organization was recognized for its work in 1969 when it was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

27. ___ Islands (autonomous part of Denmark) : FAROE
The Faroe Islands (also Faeroe Islands) are a group of islands lying halfway between Scotland and Iceland. The Faroe Islands are part of the Kingdom of Denmark and were granted the power of self-governance in 1948.

29. G.O.P. org. : RNC
National leadership of the Republican Party is provided by the Republican National Committee (RNC). Only one chairperson of the RNC has been elected to the office of US president, and that is George H. W. Bush.

The Republican Party has had the nickname Grand Old Party (GOP) since 1875. That said, the phrase was coined in the “Congressional Record” as “this gallant old party”. The moniker was changed to “grand old party” in 1876 in an article in the “Cincinnati Commercial”. The Republican Party’s elephant mascot dates back to an 1874 cartoon drawn by Thomas Nast for “Harper’s Weekly”. The Democrat’s donkey was already an established symbol. Nast drew a donkey clothed in a lion’s skin scaring away the other animals. One of the scared animals was an elephant, which Nast labeled “The Republican Vote”.

32. Erik of “CHiPs” : ESTRADA
Actor Erik Estrada got his big break in the movie “Airport 1975”, before playing motorcycle police officer Poncherello on the television show “CHiPs” from 1977-81.

37. Odin’s realm : ASGARD
Asgard is one of the Nine Worlds of Norse religions. It is where the Norse gods live, and is also home to Valhalla, the enormous hall ruled over by the god Odin.

41. Muscle builder for Popeye : SPINACH
Popeye first appeared in 1929 in a comic strip called “Thimble Theatre”. The strip, created by E. C. Segar, ran for ten years before Popeye made an appearance. Popeye received such a great welcome from readers that he soon “took over” the strip, and eventually even hogged the strip’s title. Before Popeye turned up Olive Oyl was the main character.

45. Mark in the intersection of 19-Across and 11-Down : CIRCUMFLEX
A circumflex is a diacritic mark used routinely in some languages, such as French. For example, there’s a circumflex over the first “e” in “être”, the French for “to be”.

47. Coffeehouse combo, often : DUO
I guess the reference is to a musical duo that might play in a coffeehouse.

48. Lightning Bolt : USAIN
Usain Bolt is a Jamaican sprinter who won the 100m and 200m race gold medals in both the 2008 and 2012 Olympic Games. Back in Jamaica, Bolt was really into cricket and probably would have been a very successful fast bowler had he not hit the track instead.

49. “Footloose” hero ___ McCormack : REN
The 1984 musical drama “Footloose” tells the story of a Chicago teen (played by Kevin Bacon) who moves to a small town in which dancing and rock music has been banned. The storyline is loosely based on real events in the Oklahoma City of Elmore. Dancing was banned in Elmore for almost 100 years, with the ban eventually being lifted in 1980.

52. Denouement : END
The “denouement” is the final resolution of a dramatic plot. The term is French, and derives from the Old French for “untying”, an “unknotting” as it were.

55. Tempe sch. : ASU
Arizona State University (ASU) has a long history, founded as the Tempe Normal School for the Arizona Territory in 1885. The athletic teams of ASU used to be known as the Normals, then the Bulldogs, and since 1946 they’ve been called the Sun Devils.

56. 12 meses : AÑO
In Spanish, there are twelve “meses” (months) in an “año” (year).

58. French waiter : GARÇON
“Garçon” is the French word for “boy”, and may be applied to a waiter in a restaurant.

60. E-guffaw : LOL
Laugh out loud (LOL, in text-speak)

62. Mark in the intersection of 17-Across and 1-Down : UMLAUT
An “umlaut” (also “diaeresis”) is a diacritical mark consisting of two horizontal dots placed over a letter, usually a vowel. Here in the West, we are perhaps most familiar with umlauts in German, as in “schön”, meaning “beautiful”.

63. Part of a financial portfolio, for short : IRA
Individual Retirement Account (IRA)

65. “___ Fables” : AESOP’S
Aesop is remembered today for his famous fables. Aesop lived in Ancient Greece, probably around the sixth century BC. Supposedly he was born a slave, somehow became a free man, but then met with a sorry end. Aesop was sent to the city of Delphi on a diplomatic mission but instead insulted the Delphians. He was tried on a trumped-up charge of stealing from a temple, sentenced to death and was thrown off a cliff.

Down
1. One-named singer from Iceland : BJÖRK
Björk is a rather eccentric singer-songwriter from Iceland who is a big hit in the UK in particular. Björk is the daughter of a nationally-recognized union leader in her home country.

3. Midshipmen, after commission : ENSIGNS
Ensign is (usually) the most junior rank of commissioned officer in the armed forces. The name comes from the tradition that the junior officer would be given the task of carrying the ensign flag.

6. Migratory seabird : TERN
Terns are seabirds that are found all over the world. The Arctic Tern makes a very long-distance migration. One Arctic Tern that was tagged as a chick in Great Britain in the summer of 1982, was spotted in Melbourne, Australia just three months later. The bird had traveled over 14,000 miles in over those three months, an average of about 150 miles a day. Remarkable …

7. Mark in the intersection of 58-Across and 43-Down : CEDILLA
A cedilla is the diacritical mark found under the letter C in many French words, as in the word “garçon”.

8. Rocky Mountains rodent : MARMOT
Marmots are large ground squirrels. Included in the genus is the famous groundhog, but not the prairie dog.

11. Restaurant V.I.P. : MAÎTRE D’
The full name of a “maître d’” is “maître d’hôtel”, which means “master of the hotel”.

12. Frontman of the “Welcome to the Jungle” band : AXL ROSE
Axl Rose is the lead vocalist of the American rock band, Guns N’ Roses.

Guns N’ Roses is a hard rock band founded in 1985 that is still going strong. The group was pulled together by Axl Rose, the lead vocalist. The lead-guitar player back then was Tracii Guns, and it was the combination of Axl and Tracii’s “family” names that led to the band being called Guns N’ Roses.

22. Mark in the intersection of 56-Across and 38-Down : TILDE
As in say, piñata.

23. “Elephant Boy” boy : SABU
The 1937 British film “Elephant Boy” starred a young Indian elephant driver called Sabu Dastagir. Sabu (he was often known just by the one name) made more British films over the next few years, including “The Thief of Baghdad” in 1940 and the 1942 version of “The Jungle book”. Sabu moved to Hollywood and became a US citizen in 1944. He joined the US Army Air Forces and served as a tail gunner in the Pacific, eventually winning the Distinguished Flying Cross for valor and bravery. Sadly, in 1963 Sabu died of a heart attack at only 39 years of age.

28. Alf and Mork, for short : ETS
“ALF” is a sitcom that aired in the late eighties. ALF is a hand-puppet, supposedly an alien from the planet Melmac that crash-landed in a suburban neighborhood. “ALF” stands for “alien life form”.

“Mork & Mindy” was broadcast from 1978 to 1982. We were first introduced to Mork (played by Robin Williams) in a special episode of “Happy Days”. The particular episode in question has a bizarre storyline culminating in Fonzie and Mork having a thumb-to-finger duel. Eventually Richie wakes up in bed, and alien Mork was just part of a dream! Oh, and “Nanu Nanu” means both “hello” and “goodbye” back on the planet Ork. “I am Mork from Ork, Nanu Nanu”. Great stuff …

30. The N.C.A.A.’s Aggies, informally : A AND M
Texas A&M is the seventh largest university in the country, and was the first public higher education institute in the state when it accepted its first students in 1876. The full name of the school was the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas and its primary mission used to be the education of males in the techniques of farming and military warfare. That’s quite a combination! Because of the agricultural connection, the college’s sports teams use the moniker “Aggies”.

31. DNA strand shape : HELIX
Francis Crick and James Watson discovered that DNA had a double-helix, chain-like structure, and published their results in Cambridge in 1953. To this day the discovery is mired in controversy, as some crucial results collected by fellow researcher Rosalind Franklin were used without her permission or even knowledge.

33. Any airing of “Friends,” now : RERUN
The six title characters in the sitcom “Friends” met each other in the Central Perk coffeehouse from the very first episode. There is now a Central Perk franchise in the reality, with locations all around the globe. The Central Perk in Dubai was opened by actor James Michael Tyler, who played the coffeehouse manager Gunther on the show.

37. Prefix with pressure : ACU-
Acupressure and acupuncture are related alternative medical techniques. Both aim to clear blockages in the flow of life energy through the body’s meridians. The treatment is given by stimulating “acupoints’ in the body, by applying pressure in the case of acupressure, and by applying needles in the case of acupuncture.

39. What may be in a breakfast bar : GRANOLA
The name “Granola” (and “Granula”) were trademarked back in the late 1800s for whole-grain foods that were crumbled and baked until crisp. Granola was created in Dansville, New York in 1894.

40. Pepto-Bismol target : ACID
Pepto-Bismol was originally marketed as a remedy for infant diarrhea, and sold under the name “Bismosol: Mixture Cholera Infantum”.

42. Hoopla : ADO
The word “hoopla” means “boisterous excitement”. The term probably comes from “houp-là”, something the French say instead of “upsy-daisy”. Then again, “upsy-daisy” probably isn’t something said very often here in the US …

43. Neighbor of Aruba : CURAÇAO
Curaçao is one of the so-called ABC Islands. “ABC Islands” is the nickname given to the three westernmost islands of the Leeward Antilles in the Caribbean. The nickname comes from the first letters of the island names: Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao. All three of the ABC Islands are part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.

46. Champagne’s place : FRANCE
Champagne is a historic province in the northeast of France, famous of course for its sparkling white wine.

51. Em and Polly, in literature : AUNTS
In “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz”, Dorothy lives with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry.

Early in the story of “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer”, young Tom is punished by his Aunt Polly for dirtying his clothes in a fight. He is made to whitewash the fence surrounding the house.

54. Contents of un lago : AGUA
In Spanish, a lake (un lago) contains water (agua).

56. Boxing’s “Louisville Lip” : ALI
Cassius Marcellus Clay, Jr. was born in 1942 in Louisville, Kentucky. Clay changed his name to Muhammad Ali when he converted to Islam in 1964. Who can forget Muhammad Ali lighting the Olympic flame for the 1996 games in Atlanta? Ali was presented with a gold medal during those ’96 Games, a replacement for the medal he won at the 1960 Olympics. He had thrown the original into the Ohio River as a gesture of disgust after being refused service at a “whites only” restaurant.

57. Backboard attachment : RIM
That would be in basketball.

59. “Treasure Island” monogram : RLS
Robert Louis Stevenson’s (RLS) most celebrated work I’d say is “Treasure Island”, originally written as a series for a children’s magazine in 1881. I remember “Treasure Island” as the first “real” novel I read as a youngster …

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Screwed up big-time : BLEW IT
7. Early 10th-century year : CMIX
11. Fit to be tied : MAD
14. Dickinson with a modeling agency : JANICE
15. Leisure : EASE
16. Fire truck accessory : AXE
17. Rock’s Blue ___ Cult : ÖYSTER
18. Scott in 1857 news : DRED
19. ___ de la Cité : ÎLE
20. Triple Crown stat : RBI
21. Eventually : IN TIME
23. Orch. section : STR
24. Supreme Court justice who replaced Stevens : KAGAN
26. U.N. agcy. that promotes “decent work for all women and men” : ILO
27. ___ Islands (autonomous part of Denmark) : FAROE
29. G.O.P. org. : RNC
30. Well-wisher’s wish : ALL THE BEST
32. Erik of “CHiPs” : ESTRADA
34. Gives the slip : ELUDES
35. Ariz.-to-Kan. direction : ENE
36. ___-mo replay : SLO
37. Odin’s realm : ASGARD
41. Muscle builder for Popeye : SPINACH
45. Mark in the intersection of 19-Across and 11-Down : CIRCUMFLEX
47. Coffeehouse combo, often : DUO
48. Lightning Bolt : USAIN
49. “Footloose” hero ___ McCormack : REN
50. To a degree, informally : SORTA
52. Denouement : END
53. Awaited a tongue depressor, maybe : SAID AH
55. Tempe sch. : ASU
56. 12 meses : AÑO
57. “You ___?” (butler’s line) : RANG
58. French waiter : GARÇON
60. E-guffaw : LOL
61. Advance slowly : INCH
62. Mark in the intersection of 17-Across and 1-Down : UMLAUT
63. Part of a financial portfolio, for short : IRA
64. Greet’s partner : MEET
65. “___ Fables” : AESOP’S

Down
1. One-named singer from Iceland : BJÖRK
2. Expose for all to see : LAY BARE
3. Midshipmen, after commission : ENSIGNS
4. Jokester : WIT
5. Strand at a ski lodge, maybe : ICE IN
6. Migratory seabird : TERN
7. Mark in the intersection of 58-Across and 43-Down : CEDILLA
8. Rocky Mountains rodent : MARMOT
9. “Gotcha” : I SEE
10. Struck (out) : XED
11. Restaurant V.I.P. : MAÎTRE D’
12. Frontman of the “Welcome to the Jungle” band : AXL ROSE
13. Poor grade : DEE
22. Mark in the intersection of 56-Across and 38-Down : TILDE
23. “Elephant Boy” boy : SABU
25. Don’t just sit there : ACT
27. Arsonist, e.g. : FELON
28. Alf and Mork, for short : ETS
30. The N.C.A.A.’s Aggies, informally : A AND M
31. DNA strand shape : HELIX
33. Any airing of “Friends,” now : RERUN
36. Pass, as time : SPEND
37. Prefix with pressure : ACU-
38. Opposite of “No way, José!”? : SI, SEÑOR
39. What may be in a breakfast bar : GRANOLA
40. Pepto-Bismol target : ACID
41. Deceptive dexterity : SLEIGHT
42. Hoopla : ADO
43. Neighbor of Aruba : CURAÇAO
44. Steaming bowlful : HOT SOUP
46. Champagne’s place : FRANCE
50. “Tsk, tsk!” : SHAME!
51. Em and Polly, in literature : AUNTS
53. Mentally together : SANE
54. Contents of un lago : AGUA
56. Boxing’s “Louisville Lip” : ALI
57. Backboard attachment : RIM
59. “Treasure Island” monogram : RLS

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