0519-22 NY Times Crossword 19 May 22, Thursday

Constructed by: Alex Rosen
Edited by: Will Shortz

Today’s Theme (according to Bill): Take Those Letters Away

Themed answers come in pairs. One element of each pair is a common word with some letter missing; the other element defines what those letters are:

  • 17A Punishes : DISCIPLINES (DISCIPLES + IN)
  • 19A Interrupt … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : CUT IN
  • 29A Backed financially : SUPPORTED (SPORTED + UP)
  • 31A Prep for surgery … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : SCRUB UP
  • 48A Workplace with no commute : HOME OFFICE (HOME ICE + OFF)
  • 50A Leave … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : TAKE OFF
  • 64A Brazenly disregarding : FLOUTING (FLING + OUT)
  • 66A Flail at home plate … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : STRIKE OUT

Bill’s time: 19m 25s

Bill’s errors: 2

  • SPORTED (spotted!!!)
  • CARR (Cart)

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Fuel efficiency letters : MPG

Miles per gallon (mpg)

8 Big-box hardware chain : LOWE’S

Lucius S. Lowe opened the first Lowe’s hardware store in 1921, in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina. Lucius only knew the one store, as it was his family who expanded the company after he passed away in 1940.

14 Model Campbell : NAOMI

Naomi Campbell is a supermodel from England. There’s a lot of interest in Campbell’s life off the runway, as she is known to have an explosive temper and has been charged with assault more than once. Her dating life is much-covered in the tabloids as well, and she has been romantically linked in the past with Mike Tyson and Robert De Niro.

16 Cricket fields and badminton racket heads, for two : OVALS

Cricket is the national game of England. The term “cricket” apparently comes from the Old French word “criquet” meaning “goalpost, stick”.

The game of badminton was developed in the mid-1700s by British military officers in India. There was already an old game called battledore and shuttlecock, so the creation of badminton was essentially the addition of a net and boundary lines for play. The game was launched officially as a sport in 1873 at Badminton House in Gloucestershire in England, hence the name that we now use.

20 Aptly named ski town in Utah : ALTA

Alta ski resort actually lies within the Salt Lake City Metropolitan Area. The first ski lift in the resort was opened way back in 1939. Today, Alta is one of only three ski resorts in the country that prohibits snowboarding (along with Deer Valley, Utah and Mad River Glen, Vermont. The ski resort of Snowbird, located next to Alta, has been in operation since 1971.

23 Compact disc? : MIRROR

A compact is a container for makeup.

25 Hot spot in the afternoon, say : TEA

I guess the reference here is to the oft-quoted British phrase “a spot of tea”. Mind you, I’ve only ever heard that said in jest …

26 I.C.U. specialists : RNS

A registered nurse (RN) might work in an intensive care unit (ICU).

36 City whose name is Siouan for “good place to dig potatoes” : TOPEKA

Topeka is the capital of Kansas, and is located on the Kansas River in the northeast of the state. The name “Topeka” was chosen in 1855 and translates from the Kansa and the Ioway languages as “to dig good potatoes”. The reference isn’t to the common potato but rather to the herb known as the prairie potato (also “prairie turnip”), which was an important food for many Native Americans.

37 Primitive kind of diet : PALEO

The paleolithic (or “paleo, caveman”) diet is a fad diet that became popular in the 2000s. The idea is to eat wild plants and animals that would have been available to humans during the Paleolithic era (roughly the Stone Age). This period precedes the introduction of agriculture and the domestication of animals. As a result, someone on the diet avoids consuming grains, legumes, dairy and processed foods. The diet consists mainly of lean meat (about 45-65% of the total calorie intake), non-starchy vegetables, fruits, berries and nuts.

43 They get high twice a day : TIDES

Tides are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon on the oceans. At neap tide, the smaller gravitational effect of the sun cancels out some of the moon’s effect. At spring tide, the sun and the moon’s gravitational forces act in concert causing more extreme movement of the oceans.

44 Actress Munn : OLIVIA

Olivia Munn is an actress who started her on-screen career as a TV journalist, using the name Lisa Munn. She co-hosted television’s “Attack of the Show!” before becoming a correspondent on “The Daily Show”.

46 One of Alcott’s Little Women : BETH

“Little Women” is a novel written by American author Louisa May Alcott. The quartet of “little women” comprises Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy March. Jo is a tomboy, the main character in the story, and is based on Alcott herself.

55 Constellation next to Ursa Major : LEO

The constellation named Leo can be said to resemble a lion. Others say that it resembles a bent coat hanger. “Leo” is the Latin for “lion”, but I’m not sure how to translate “coat hanger” into Latin …

The constellation Ursa Major (Latin for “Larger Bear”) is often just called “the Big Dipper” because of its resemblance to a ladle or dipper. Ursa Major also resembles a plow, and that’s what we usually call the same constellation back in Ireland, “the Plough”.

56 Prefix with skeleton : EXO-

An animal with an endoskeleton has a supporting skeleton inside its body. So, we humans have an endoskeleton. A turtle, on the other hand, has both an endoskeleton and an exoskeleton, its outer shell.

58 Hagia ___ (World Heritage Site in Istanbul) : SOPHIA

Hagia Sophia is an incredibly beautiful church that was built as a Christian basilica, was converted to an imperial mosque, and then converted to a museum in Istanbul. It has a massive dome and was the largest cathedral in the world for almost a thousand years, until Seville Cathedral was completed in 1520.

59 Concession stand morsel : RAISINET

Raisinets are chocolate-covered raisins produced by Nestlé. They are often sold in boxes in movie theaters.

A morsel is a small bite, a mouthful of food. The term “morsel” comes from the Latin “morsus” meaning “bite”.

63 One of the pounds in a pound cake : EGGS

Pound cake is so called because the traditional recipe calls for a pound of each of four ingredients:

  • a pound of flour
  • a pound of butter
  • a pound of eggs
  • a pound of sugar

I’d say that’s a lot of cake …

72 Home to the oldest continuously operating university in the Americas : PERU

Lima is the capital city of Peru. Lima was founded in 1535 by the Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro, who named it “la Ciudad de los Reyes” (the City of Kings). He chose this name because the decision to found the city was made on January 6th, the feast of the Epiphany that commemorates the visit of the three kings to Jesus in Bethlehem. Lima is home to the oldest university in all of the Americas, as San Marco University was founded in 1551 during the days of Spanish colonial rule.

Down

3 Prefix with -pod : GASTRO-

Snails and slugs are referred to collectively as gastropods. There are many, many species of gastropods, found both on land and in the sea. Gastropods with shells are generally described as snails, and those species without shells are referred to as slugs.

4 Alex and ___ (jewelry brand) : ANI

The jewelry retailer Alex and Ani was founded in 2004 and is headquartered in Cranston, Rhode Island. The founder Carolyn Rafaelian named her business for her two daughters: Alex and Ani.

5 Affiliated group of M.C.s, as for Death Row Records : RAP CREW

Death Row Records was an incredibly successful record label in the nineties. It was founded by Dr. Dre, Suge Knight, The D.O.C. and Dick Griffey. Record sales started to decline in the late nineties after the murder of its best-selling artist Tupac Shakur, and the incarceration of co-found Knight. Death Row Records filed for bankruptcy protection in 2006.

6 Rum mixer : COLA

The first cola drink to become a commercial success was Coca-Cola, soon after it was invented by a druggist in 1886. The first sales were in Jacob’s Pharmacy in Atlanta, Georgia, where a glass of the new beverage sold for five cents. That original Coca-Cola was flavored mainly with kola nuts and vanilla. The formulation was based on an alcoholic drink called Coca Wine that had been on sale for over twenty years.

7 Refine, in a way : SMELT

Metals are found in ore in the form of oxides. In order to get pure metal from the ore, the ore is heated and the metal oxides within are reduced (i.e. the oxygen is removed) in the chemical process known as smelting. The oxygen is extracted by adding a source of carbon or carbon monoxide which uses up the excess oxygen atoms to make carbon dioxide, a waste product of smelting (and, a greenhouse gas).

8 Plot points? : LOCI

“Locus” (plural “loci”) is Latin for “place”, and is used in English with the same meaning. The term can also be used to describe a center of power or activity. In mathematics, a locus is a set of points that satisfy some property. For example, a locus might be a straight line, part of a line, a surface, or perhaps a curve.

9 Fallopian tube traveler : OVUM

The Fallopian tubes leading from the ovaries of female mammals in the uterus. The tubes are named for the 16th-century Italian anatomist Gabriello Fallopio, who was the first to describe them.

11 Country’s ___ Young Band : ELI

The Eli Young Band is a country group from Texas founded by Mike Eli and James Young when they were roommates in the University of North Texas.

12 Only four-ninths of it is usually shown: Abbr. : SSN

So often, we are asked for “the last four digits” of our Social Security Numbers (SSNs).

18 Media journalist David : CARR

David Carr was a journalist and author from Minneapolis who is perhaps best remembered for his time as a cultural reporter with “The New York Times”. Carr passed away in February 2015, after collapsing in “The New York Times” newsroom.

24 Holy Roman emperor beginning in 973 : OTTO II

Otto II was also called Otto the Red. He was the son of Otto the Great and ruled the Saxon or Ottonian dynasty, becoming Holy Roman Emperor in 967 AD.

28 Yellow Pages section after “Sound Systems” : SPAS

A yellow pages phone directory is a listing of business and telephone numbers. The first yellow pages directory was introduced here in the US, back in 1886. The phrase “yellow pages” has become almost ubiquitous, although some countries (like my native Ireland) use “golden pages” instead. The term lives on in the modern era, as the name of the business review website Yelp.com is a contraction of “YEL-low P-ages”.

30 Dramatic tango move : DIP

The dramatic tango dance originated in the late 1800s in the area along the border between Argentina and Uruguay. Dancers and orchestras from Buenos Aires in particular traveled to Europe and beyond in the early twentieth century and brought the tango with them. The tango craze first struck Europe in Paris in the 1910s, and from there spread to London and Berlin, crossing the Atlantic to New York in 1913.

32 Abstract Expressionist Mark : ROTHKO

Mark Rothko was a Russian-American painter who is often classified as an abstract expressionist. Rothko’s 1961 painting “Orange, Red, Yellow” was sold in 2012 at auction for over $86 million dollars, a record price for any post-war contemporary work of art.

33 News inits. since 1958 : UPI

Founded in 1958, United Press International (UPI) used to be one of the biggest news agencies in the world, sending out news by wire to the major newspapers. UPI ran into trouble with the change in media formats at the end of the twentieth century and lost many of its clients as the afternoon newspapers shut down due to the advent of television news. UPI, which once employed thousands, still exists today but with just a fraction of that workforce.

37 Four-time Hugo Award winner Frederik : POHL

Frederik Pohl is an American science-fiction writer, a winner of three Hugo Awards. Pohl started off his career as a literary agent, and was the only agent ever hired by Isaac Asimov.

The Hugo Awards are presented annually for excellence in science fiction and fantasy writing. The awards are named for Hugo Gernsback, founder of the sci-fi magazine “Amazing Stories”.

39 Prom night booking : LIMO RIDE

The word “limousine” derives from the name of the French city of Limoges. The area around Limoges is called the Limousin, and it gave its name to a cloak hood worn by local shepherds. In early motor cars, a driver would sit outside in the weather while the passengers would sit in the covered compartment. The driver would often wear a limousin-style protective hood, giving rise to that type of transportation being called a “limousine”. Well, that’s how the story goes …

40 Biblical progenitor : EVE

Eve is named as the wife of Adam in the Hebrew Bible and Christian Old Testament. However, Adam’s wife is not specifically named in the Qur’an.

51 Sport in which you could use some pointers? : EPEE

The sword known as an épée has a three-sided blade. It is similar to a foil and saber, although the foil and saber have rectangular cross-sections.

60 Psychoanalyst Freud, daughter of Sigmund : ANNA

Anna Freud was a psychoanalyst who was the youngest child of Sigmund Freud, the founder of the discipline. Anna left Vienna along with her family and settled in London after the Nazis annexed Austria in 1938. She is considered, along with Melanie Klein, to have founded psychoanalytic child psychology.

61 Marty Feldman’s role in “Young Frankenstein” : IGOR

In the world of movies, Igor has been the assistant to Dracula, Frankenstein and Young Frankenstein among others. Igor is almost invariably portrayed as a hunchback.

Marty Feldman was a very talented comedy writer and performer from England. He is best known in the US for playing Igor in the Mel Brooks movie “Young Frankenstein”, for which performance Feldman won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar. I’ll always remember a famous sketch he did for British television called “The Loneliness of the Long Distance Golfer”. Hilarious stuff …

I am not really a big fan of movies by Mel Brooks, but “Young Frankenstein” is the exception. I think the cast has a lot to do with me liking the film, as it includes Gene Wilder (Dr. Frankenstein), Teri Garr (Inga), Marty Feldman (Igor) and Gene Hackman (Harold, the blind man).

62 Big name in Art Deco : ERTE

“Erté” was the pseudonym of French (Russian-born) artist and designer Romain de Tirtoff. “Erté” is the French pronunciation of his initials “R.T.” Erté’s diverse portfolio of work included costumes and sets for the “Ziegfeld Follies” of 1923, productions of the Parisian cabaret show “Folies Bergère”, as well as the 1925 epic movie “Ben-Hur”. Erté’s most famous work by far is an image titled “Symphony in Black”. It depicts a tall and slender woman dressed in black, holding a black dog on a leash.

64 N.F.L. three-pointers: Abbr. : FGS

Field goal (FG)

67 Sch. 50 miles west of 36-Across : KSU

Kansas State University (KSU) was founded as the Kansas State Agricultural College in 1863 during the Civil War. The main KSU campus is located in the city of Manhattan, which is 56 miles northwest of Topeka, Kansas.

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Fuel efficiency letters : MPG
4 They may join in a circle : ARCS
8 Big-box hardware chain : LOWE’S
13 “That’s it!” : AHA!
14 Model Campbell : NAOMI
16 Cricket fields and badminton racket heads, for two : OVALS
17 Punishes : DISCIPLINES (DISCIPLES + IN)
19 Interrupt … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : CUT IN
20 Aptly named ski town in Utah : ALTA
21 Stop the clock : CALL TIME
23 Compact disc? : MIRROR
25 Hot spot in the afternoon, say : TEA
26 I.C.U. specialists : RNS
29 Backed financially : SUPPORTED (SPORTED + UP)
31 Prep for surgery … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : SCRUB UP
34 Multiple of one? : TWIN
36 City whose name is Siouan for “good place to dig potatoes” : TOPEKA
37 Primitive kind of diet : PALEO
41 Subject of job offer negotiations : PAY
43 They get high twice a day : TIDES
44 Actress Munn : OLIVIA
46 One of Alcott’s Little Women : BETH
48 Workplace with no commute : HOME OFFICE (HOME ICE + OFF)
50 Leave … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : TAKE OFF
55 Constellation next to Ursa Major : LEO
56 Prefix with skeleton : EXO-
58 Hagia ___ (World Heritage Site in Istanbul) : SOPHIA
59 Concession stand morsel : RAISINET
63 One of the pounds in a pound cake : EGGS
64 Brazenly disregarding : FLOUTING (FLING + OUT)
66 Flail at home plate … or what to do as you enter the answer to the previous clue : STRIKE OUT
68 “Heaven forbid!” : GOD NO!
69 Pledge drive bags : TOTES
70 Gold in them thar hills, e.g. : ORE
71 Promise : SWEAR
72 Home to the oldest continuously operating university in the Americas : PERU
73 Retreat : DEN

Down

1 Sophisticated ladies : MADAMS
2 Queen Elizabeth’s husband : PHILIP
3 Prefix with -pod : GASTRO-
4 Alex and ___ (jewelry brand) : ANI
5 Affiliated group of M.C.s, as for Death Row Records : RAP CREW
6 Rum mixer : COLA
7 Refine, in a way : SMELT
8 Plot points? : LOCI
9 Fallopian tube traveler : OVUM
10 Something to sleep on with no springs : WATERBED
11 Country’s ___ Young Band : ELI
12 Only four-ninths of it is usually shown: Abbr. : SSN
15 Lands in the ocean : ISLES
18 Media journalist David : CARR
22 It’s said to be “the art of recognizing when to be big and when not to belittle” : TACT
24 Holy Roman emperor beginning in 973 : OTTO II
27 Quickly heat up, in a way : NUKE
28 Yellow Pages section after “Sound Systems” : SPAS
30 Dramatic tango move : DIP
32 Abstract Expressionist Mark : ROTHKO
33 News inits. since 1958 : UPI
35 Snag : NAB
37 Four-time Hugo Award winner Frederik : POHL
38 Potted ornamental : ALOE
39 Prom night booking : LIMO RIDE
40 Biblical progenitor : EVE
42 “And ___ …” : YET
45 Super-duper : ACES
47 Better prepared, perhaps : TASTIER
49 Just be oneself : EXIST
51 Sport in which you could use some pointers? : EPEE
52 “Great to hear!” : OH GOOD!
53 Reckon : FIGURE
54 Secure : FASTEN
57 In first place : ON TOP
60 Psychoanalyst Freud, daughter of Sigmund : ANNA
61 Marty Feldman’s role in “Young Frankenstein” : IGOR
62 Big name in Art Deco : ERTE
64 N.F.L. three-pointers: Abbr. : FGS
65 Temperature extreme : LOW
67 Sch. 50 miles west of 36-Across : KSU

11 thoughts on “0519-22 NY Times Crossword 19 May 22, Thursday”

  1. 15:20, no errors. Clever theme. I finally understood how it worked after seeing the third example, at which point I went back and changed SPOTTED to SPORTED before continuing, else I’d have ended up with the same error as Bill. (A near thing … 😳.)

    To borrow a line from Jeff: one that was easy … except when it wasn’t … 😜.

  2. 24:56, no errors. That was pretty clever. Same as @Nonny. I had the CART before the CARR.

  3. 18:32. Hand up for SPORTED before SPOTTED, but the theme helped me correct it as I saw SUPPORTED once I got the theme. Took me forever to figure out the theme, but once I did, I used it.

    I dig (really like) good potatoes. Does that mean I TOPEKA? I’ll never look at that name the same way again.

    Best –

  4. 26:02 I had “sported” only because I had “Carr” first. That said don’t ask me about having “Rothke”….

  5. 13:22, 1 Natick. Basically overall, this thing was just confusing and poorly communicated.

  6. 3 errors. Same place as others but different answer. I thought 29A was SPONSORED with UP being the clue.
    I used the end of 23A to go UP and get OR then finish with ED. that gave me OSTO II instead of OTTO.

    I guess I was wrong.

  7. I had BUT IN for 19A and should have realized that but was with 2 B,s.
    I lost track of time as two scam calls came in while I was doing this one. I love to answer them and play their stupid games. When one of the callers asked for my name I told him it was Kissam Yass…a few seconds passed and he got the message🤪🤪
    Stay safe😀

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