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CROSSWORD SETTER: Peter A. Collins
THEME: Needlepoint
The circled letters in today’s grid represents a piece of NEEDLEPOINT. Under the phrase HOME SWEET HOME there’s a THREE-STORY HOUSE with a SLATE ROOF. Very inventive!
17A. With 18- and 19-Across, classic song that starts “‘Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam” : HOME
18A. See 17-Across : SWEET
19A. See 17-Across : HOME24A. Popular setting for 17-/18-/19-Across : NEEDLEPOINT
47A. With 53- and 56-Across, certain abode : THREE-
53A. See 47-Across : STORY
56A. See 47-Across : HOUSE
BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME:12m 27s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0
Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Shapes of bacilli bacteria : RODS
All bacilli are rod-shaped bacteria, although all rod-shaped bacteria aren’t necessarily bacilli. One of the more famous members of the genus Bacillus is Bacillus anthracis, which causes anthrax.
10. North-of-the-border station : ESSO
The brand name Esso has its roots in the old Standard Oil company as it uses the initial letters of “Standard” and “Oil” (ESS-O). The Esso brand was replaced by Exxon in the US, but ESSO is still used in many other countries.
14. State that voted Republican by the highest percentage (73%) in the 2012 presidential election : UTAH
In the 2012 US presidential election, the state that most leaned towards Republican candidate Mitt Romney was Utah, giving him 73% of the vote. The state that most leaned towards Democratic candidate Barack Obama was Hawaii, giving him 71% of the vote. Also, President Obama won 91% of the vote in the District of Columbia.
15. River to the Rhône : ISERE
The Isère river gives its name to the French Department of Isère, located partly in the French Alps. In turn, Isère gave its name to a somewhat famous ship called the Isère, which in 1885 delivered the Statue of Liberty from France to America in 214 shipping crates.
16. Sporty car feature : T-TOP
A T-top is a car roof that has removable panels on either side of a rigid bar that runs down the center of the vehicle above the driver.
17. With 18- and 19-Across, classic song that starts “‘Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam” : HOME
18. See 17-Across : SWEET
19. See 17-Across : HOME
“Home! Sweet Home!” is a song that has been around at least since 1827. The melody was composed by Englishman Sir Henry Bishop, using lyrics written by American John Howard Payne.
Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,
Be it ever so humble, there’s no place like home;
A charm from the skies seems to hallow us there,
Which seek thro’ the world, is ne’er met elsewhere.
Home! Home!
Sweet, sweet home!
There’s no place like home
There’s no place like home!
22. Hero war pilot : ACE
A flying ace is an aviator who has shot down a number of enemy planes during combat. The qualifying number of kills seems to vary, but five is common. The first use of “ace” was during WWI when the French newspapers dubbed pilot Adolphe Pegoud “l’as” (French for “the ace”) when he shot down his fifth German plane.
27. Hagen of stage and screen : UTA
Uta Hagen was a German-born American actress. Hagen married Jose Ferrer in 1938, but they were divorced ten years later after it was revealed that she was having a long-running affair with Paul Robeson. Her association with Robeson, a prominent civil rights activist, earned her a spot on the Hollywood Blacklist during the McCarthy Era. This forced her away from film, but towards a successful stage career in New York City.
30. GPS suggestion: Abbr. : RTE
A Global Positioning System (GPS) might suggest a route (rte.).
34. Swinger’s target at a party : PINATA
Piñatas originated in Mexico, probably among the Aztecs or Mayans. Today piñatas are usually made from cardboard that is brightly decorated with papier-mâché. Traditionally a piñata was made out of a clay pot, adorned with feathers and ribbons and filled with small treasures. During religious ceremonies the clay pots would be suspended and broken open so that the contents would spill out onto the ground at the feet of a god as an offering.
36. Yale, affectionately : OLD ELI
Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut was founded in 1701, making it the third-oldest university in the US. Originally called the Collegiate School, it was renamed to Yale University in honor of retired merchant from London called Elihu Yale, who made generous contributions to the institution. Yale University’s nickname is “Old Eli”, in a nod to the benefactor.
38. Façade feature : CEDILLA
A cedilla is the diacritical mark found under the letter C in many French words, as in the words “garçon” and “façade”.
40. Small flycatchers : PHOEBES
The phoebe is a small, insect-eating bird that is native to North and South America.
41. Korean performer with a monster 2012 international hit : PSY
PSY is the stage name of South Korean rapper Park Jae-sang. PSY became an international star when his 2102 music video “Gangnam Style” went viral on YouTube. That video had over 1 billion views on YouTube in about six months, making it the most viewed YouTube video clip of all time. I am not one of that one billion …
42. Jeanne d’Arc, e.g.: Abbr. : STE
“Sainte” (ste.) is French for “saint”, when referring to a female.
Joan of Arc (also “Jeanne d’Arc”, her birth name) led the French Army successfully into battle a number of times during the Hundred Years War with England. When she was eventually captured, Joan was tried in Rouen, the seat of the occupying English government in France at that time. There she was burned at the stake having been found guilty of heresy. Joan of Arc was canonized some 600 years later, in 1920, and is now one of the patron saints of France.
44. 1974-75 pigskin org. : WFL
The World Football League was formed in 1974 with the intent of bringing American football to the rest of the world. It didn’t work, and the whole thing closed down in 1975.
“Pigskin” is a slang term for the ball used in American football.
45. Pastoral poem : IDYL
An idyl is a short poem with a pastoral theme, usually depicting the scene in romantic and idealized terms. The word comes from the Greek “eidyllion”, which literally translates to “little picture” but was a word describing a short, poem with a rustic theme.
49. Certain military hazards, for short : IEDS
Sadly, having spent much of my life in the border areas between southern and Northern Ireland, I am all too familiar with the devastating effects of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs). One has to admire the bravery of soldiers who spend their careers defusing (or attempting to defuse) such devices in order to save the lives and property of others. Of course these days, IEDs are very much in the news in Iraq and Afghanistan.
54. Q*___ (1980s arcade game) : BERT
Q*bert is an arcade game that was introduced in 1982. It’s the game where a character with a big nose (Q*bert) jumps up and down on cubes arranged in a big pyramid.
55. Homer Simpson cry : D’OH!
“The Simpsons” is one of the most successful programs produced by the Fox Broadcasting Company. Homer Simpson’s catchphrase is “D’oh!”, which became such a famous exclamation that it has been included in the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) since 2001. “D’oh!” can be translated as “I should have thought of that!”
57. “___ Rosenkavalier” : DER
“Der Rosenkavalier” is a comic opera composed by Richard Strauss, with the title translating as “The Knight of the Rose”.
58. Bygone Ugandan despot : IDI AMIN
Idi Amin received most of his military training in the British armed forces, eventually achieving the highest rank possible for a Black African in the British Colonial Army in 1959, that of Warrant Officer. On his return to Uganda Amin joined his country’s military and quickly rose to the rank of Deputy Commander of the Army. During that time he was quite the athlete. He was a noted rugby player and swimmer, and for nine years held the Ugandan national light-heavyweight boxing title. By the early seventies, Amin was commander of all the armed forces of Uganda and in 1971 seized power in a military coup, displacing the country’s president Milton Obote. There followed seven years of brutal rule by Amin during which it is estimated that between 100,000 and 500,000 people were murdered. Amin was ousted from power in 1979 after a war with Tanzania, and fled to Libya where he stayed for a year. He then moved to Saudi Arabia, where he was financially supported by the Saudi Royal Family for the remainder of his life. Amin died in 2003.
A “despot” is a ruler with absolute power, often one who wields that power oppressively. “Despot” is an old French term from the 14th century, ultimately derived from the Greek “despotes” meaning “master of a household, absolute ruler”.
61. Oxide in rubies and sapphires : ALUMINA
“Alumina” is a common name for the compound aluminium oxide (Al2O3). Alumina occurs naturally as the mineral corundum. Varieties of corundum form rubies and sapphires.
67. Where femurs are located : THIGHS
The thigh bone, the femur, is the longest and the largest bone in the human body.
Down
1. Germany’s ___ Valley : RUHR
The Ruhr is a river in Germany that flows into the lower Rhine. The river gives its name to the Ruhr River Valley and the Ruhr district, the largest urban agglomeration in the country.
2. Indian tribe that lent its name to a county in Nebraska : OTOE
The Otoe (also Oto) Native American tribe originated in the Great Lakes region as part of the Winnebago or Siouan tribes. The group that would become the Otoe broke away from the Winnebago and migrated southwestwards ending up in the Great Plains. In the plains the Otoe adopted a semi-nomadic lifestyle dependent on the horse, with the American bison becoming central to their diet.
3. Classical exemplars of steadfast friendship : DAMON AND PYTHIAS
Damon and Pythias were two loyal friends in Greek mythology. Pythias was sentenced to death, and released to settle his affairs after Damon agreed to take his place and assume the death sentence should his friend not return. After a lot of misadventures, the devoted friendship exhibited between the two convinced the magistrates to commute the sentence.
4. Hite of “The Hite Report” : SHERE
Shere Hite is a German sex educator, although she was born in the US. Hite’s work focuses on sexual experience and what meaning it holds for an individual.
5. Modern prefix with gender : CIS-
The term “cisgender” is now used as the opposite of “transgender”. Cisgender people have a gender identity that matches the sex they were assigned at birth.
6. Comedian Patton ___ : OSWALT
Patton Oswalt is a stand-up comedian who is best known on television for playing Spencer Olchin on “The King of Queens”. He also voiced the lead character of Remy in the animated movie from Pixar called “Ratatouille”.
8. Having one’s business mentioned in a news article, e.g. : FREE PR
Public relations (PR)
10. Patriot Allen : ETHAN
Ethan Allen was one of the founders of the state of Vermont. Allen was also a hero in the American Revolutionary War, famous for leading (along with Benedict Arnold) the small band of men that captured Fort Ticonderoga. And yes, the Ethan Allen store and furniture line is named for Ethan Allen the patriot, even though he had nothing to do with the furniture business.
13. German-based G.M. subsidiary : OPEL
Adam Opel founded his company in 1863, first making sewing machines in a cowshed. Commercial success brought new premises and a new product line in 1886, namely penny-farthing bicycles. Adam Opel died in 1895, leaving his two sons with a company that made more penny-farthings and sewing machines than any other company in the world. In 1899 the two sons partnered with a locksmith and started to make cars, but not very successfully. Two years later, the locksmith was dropped in favor of a licensing arrangement with a French car company. By 1914, Opel was the largest manufacturer of automobiles in Germany. My Dad had an Opel in the seventies, a station wagon (we’d say “estate car” in Ireland) called an Opel Kadett.
21. How George Harrison’s guitar “weeps” : GENTLY
“While My Guitar Gently Weeps” is a beautiful 1968 Beatles song that was written by George Harrison. The original recording (for “the White Album”) featured Eric Clapton on lead guitar, although he didn’t get any formal credit on the album cover.
26. “Looking at it a different way,” in texts : OTOH
On the other hand (OTOH)
27. Something a scanner scans, in brief : UPC
UPC stands for Universal Price Code or Universal Product Code. The first UPC-marked item to get scanned in a store was on June 26, 1974 at 08:01 a.m. at Marsh’s supermarket in Troy, Ohio. It was a 10-pack of Wrigley’s Juicy Fruit chewing gum.
32. Stein filler : ALE
A stein is a type of beer glass. The term is German in origin, and is short for “Steinkrug” meaning “stone jug”. “Stein” is the German for “stone”.
33. Insult, informally : DIS
“Dis” is a slang term meaning “insult” that originated in the eighties. It is a shortened form of “disrespect” or “dismiss”.
37. “Clear!” procedure, for short : DEFIB
A defibrillator (defib) might be operated by an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT).
39. Actor Kutcher and others : ASHTONS
The actor Ashton Kutcher was born in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. He has a fraternal twin named Michael who needed a heart transplant when the brothers were quite young. Ashton played the character Michael Kelso on Fox’s “That ‘70s Show”. Kelso was Kutcher’s breakthrough acting role. More recently, Kutcher appeared on the sitcom “Two and a Half Men”, replacing the “disgraced” Charlie Sheen. In 2009, Kutcher became the first user on Twitter to get over 1 million followers. I wasn’t one of them …
43. Pants, in slang : TROU
“Trou” is short for “trousers”.
The term “pants”, meaning trousers, is an abbreviated form of “pantaloons” that first appeared in the 1840s. Pantaloons were a kind of tights named for a silly old male character in Italian comedy called “Pantaloun” who always wore tight trousers over skinny legs.
45. Former Indian P.M. Gandhi : INDIRA
Indira Gandhi’s father was Jawaharlal Nehru, Prime Minister of India (and the “Nehru” of the Nehru Jacket). Indira herself became Prime Minister in 1966. She was assassinated in 1984 by two of her own bodyguards, as she was walking to meet Peter Ustinov who was about to interview her for Irish television.
46. Semiconductor devices : DIODES
A diode is component in a circuit, the most notable characteristic of which is that it will conduct electric current in only one direction. Some of those vacuum tubes we used to see in old radios and television were diodes, but nowadays almost all diodes are semiconductor devices.
59. Hairy primate : APE
60. Not-so-hairy primates : MEN
Primates are mammals, many of whom are omnivorous and make good use of their hands. They also have larger brains relative to their body size, compared to other animals. The order Primates includes apes, lemurs, baboons and humans.
62. Durham sch. : UNH
The University of New Hampshire (UNH) is the largest university in the state. It was founded as the New Hampshire College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts in 1866.
63. ___ tai (drink) : MAI
The Mai Tai cocktail is strongly associated with the Polynesian islands, but the drink was supposedly invented in 1944 in Trader Vic’s restaurant in Oakland, California. One recipe is 6 parts white rum, 3 parts orange curaçao, 3 parts Orgeat syrup, 1 part rock candy syrup, 2 parts fresh lime juice, all mixed with ice and then a float added of 6 parts dark rum.
For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Shapes of bacilli bacteria : RODS
5. Snug : COMFY
10. North-of-the-border station : ESSO
14. State that voted Republican by the highest percentage (73%) in the 2012 presidential election : UTAH
15. River to the Rhône : ISERE
16. Sporty car feature : T-TOP
17. With 18- and 19-Across, classic song that starts “‘Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam” : HOME
18. See 17-Across : SWEET
19. See 17-Across : HOME
20. Company shake-up, for short : REORG
22. Hero war pilot : ACE
23. Suit coat feature : LAPEL
24. Popular setting for 17-/18-/19-Across : NEEDLEPOINT
27. Hagen of stage and screen : UTA
29. Fanatic : NUT
30. GPS suggestion: Abbr. : RTE
31. Was down with : HAD
34. Swinger’s target at a party : PINATA
36. Yale, affectionately : OLD ELI
38. Façade feature : CEDILLA
40. Small flycatchers : PHOEBES
41. Korean performer with a monster 2012 international hit : PSY
42. Jeanne d’Arc, e.g.: Abbr. : STE
44. 1974-75 pigskin org. : WFL
45. Pastoral poem : IDYL
47. With 53- and 56-Across, certain abode : THREE-
49. Certain military hazards, for short : IEDS
52. Evening, in ads : NITE
53. See 47-Across : STORY
54. Q*___ (1980s arcade game) : BERT
55. Homer Simpson cry : D’OH!
56. See 47-Across : HOUSE
57. “___ Rosenkavalier” : DER
58. Bygone Ugandan despot : IDI AMIN
61. Oxide in rubies and sapphires : ALUMINA
64. Harvesting machines : REAPERS
65. Possession of property : TENANCY
66. What initials on something may signify : ASSENT
67. Where femurs are located : THIGHS
Down
1. Germany’s ___ Valley : RUHR
2. Indian tribe that lent its name to a county in Nebraska : OTOE
3. Classical exemplars of steadfast friendship : DAMON AND PYTHIAS
4. Hite of “The Hite Report” : SHERE
5. Modern prefix with gender : CIS-
6. Comedian Patton ___ : OSWALT
7. Little rodents, jocularly : MEECE
8. Having one’s business mentioned in a news article, e.g. : FREE PR
9. Up to now : YET
10. Patriot Allen : ETHAN
11. Avert more serious losses : STOP THE BLEEDING
12. Four or five, say : SOME
13. German-based G.M. subsidiary : OPEL
21. How George Harrison’s guitar “weeps” : GENTLY
23. Hide out : LIE LOW
25. Like many exhausts : DUAL
26. “Looking at it a different way,” in texts : OTOH
27. Something a scanner scans, in brief : UPC
28. 20-20, e.g. : TIE
32. Stein filler : ALE
33. Insult, informally : DIS
35. Dairy ___ : AISLE
37. “Clear!” procedure, for short : DEFIB
39. Actor Kutcher and others : ASHTONS
40. Watches intently : PEERS AT
43. Pants, in slang : TROU
45. Former Indian P.M. Gandhi : INDIRA
46. Semiconductor devices : DIODES
47. Improper attire at a fancy restaurant : T-SHIRT
48. Hole in one’s shoe : EYELET
50. Make sopping wet : DRENCH
51. Humane Society pickups : STRAYS
59. Hairy primate : APE
60. Not-so-hairy primates : MEN
62. Durham sch. : UNH
63. ___ tai (drink) : MAI