0920-25 NY Times Crossword 20 Sep 25, Saturday

Bill’s time: 26m 22s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

10A Group that believes in Gelassenheit (submission to God’s will) : AMISH

The Amish are members of a group of Christian churches, and a subgroup of the Mennonite churches. The Amish church originated in Switzerland and Alsace in 1693 when it was founded by Jakob Ammann. It was Ammann who gave the name to the Amish people. Many Amish people came to Pennsylvania in the 18th century.

15A New customs might incite them : TRADE WARS

Excise taxes differ from customs duties. Excise taxes are imposed on goods within a nation’s borders, whereas customs duties are imposed at the border on importation.

16A Verso’s counterpart : RECTO

The left and right pages of a book or magazine are known in publishing circles as verso and recto. Recto comes from the Latin for “right”, and verso comes from the Latin word for “turned”. The idea is that the left side of the page is “turned” and is the reverse of the recto/right side.

19A Free of typos, say : EMEND

The verb “to amend” means “to change for the better, put right, alter by adding”. The related verb “to emend” is used more rarely, and mainly in reference to the editing of professional writing. Both terms are derived from the Latin “emendare” meaning “to remove fault”.

20A Hill folk, informally : POLS

The designer of Washington D.C., Pierre L’Enfant, chose the crest of a hill as the site for the future Congress House. He called the location “Jenkins Hill” and “Jenkins Heights”. Earlier records show the name as “New Troy”. Today, we call it “Capitol Hill”.

29A Sports org. in a 1976 merger : ABA

The American Basketball Association (ABA) merged with the National Basketball Association (NBA) in 1976. The ABA used a ball with the colors red, white and blue. The NBA uses a more traditional orange ball.

39A Kate and Allie of 1980s TV, e.g. : MOTHERS

The sitcom “Kate & Allie” ran from 1984 to 1989, starring Susan Saint James as Kate, and Jane Curtin as Allie. Jane Curtin won two Emmy awards for her work on the series, while Susan Saint James … did not.

40A Conference acronym : TED

The acronym “TED” stands for “Technology, Entertainment and Design”. TED is a set of conferences held around the world by a non-profit group called the Sapling Foundation. The conference subjects are varied, and the meetings are often led by big names such as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, Bill Gates and Jane Goodall. The Sapling Foundation then makes recordings of the conferences available for free online with the intent of disseminating the ideas globally. These conferences are known as “TED Talks”. There are also TEDx events, which are locally-run talks presented under license from TED.

49A Watch unseen : LURK

A “lurker” is someone who visits websites, especially a discussion forum, and who just reads but does not make a contribution or leave a comment. In other words, someone who just lurks in the background. I know you’re out there … 🙂

51A Strip of wood from which a bow is carved : STAVE

The word “stave” was originally the plural of “staff”, a word describing a wooden rod. To “stave off” originated with the concept of holding off with a staff. In the world of barrel-making, a stave is a narrow strip of wood that forms part of a barrel’s side.

53A ___ acid (staining agent used in electron microscopy) : OSMIC

Osmium is a metallic element in the platinum family. It is the densest naturally occurring element, and is about twice as dense as lead.

An electron microscope is a one that uses a beam of electrons rather than visible light to illuminate the sample. Electron microscopes can reveal smaller structures than optical microscopes because the wavelength of an electron beam can be up to 100,000 times shorter than visible light photons.

59A Famous around-the-world traveler : SANTA

The North American Defense Command (NORAD) isn’t just a US operation but is a cooperative arrangement between Canada and the United States. The two countries entered into an agreement to establish NORAD in 1958, mainly due to the concern that there would be little or no warning of a missile attack from the Soviet Union that came over the North Pole. NORAD also tracks Santa Claus coming from the North Pole every Christmas, and these days publishes Santa’s location on Christmas Eve on its website. The tracking of Santa started into 1955 when a local Sears store placed an advertisement in a Colorado Springs newspaper with a phone number that could be used to call Santa Claus. The newspaper accidentally printed the number for the Continental Air Defense Command (a precursor to NORAD). The officer on duty instructed his staff to give all children who called a “current location” for Santa. Today, NORAD gets about 120,000 phone queries about Santa’s location every year, and the website gets about 20 million visitors.

60A Slower, musically : MENO MOSSO

“Meno Mosso” is a musical term, one meaning that the music should be played at a reduced speed. It is Italian for “less agitated”.

Down

1D Catholic university in Florida or its home town : ST LEO

Saint Leo University is a private Roman Catholic school located in the town of St. Leo, Florida. The school was founded in 1889 by a group of Benedictine monks, making it the oldest Catholic college in the state. Saint Leo was named for Pope Leo I.

4D Original plot : EDEN

According to the Book of Genesis, Adam and Eve lived in a garden “in” Eden, with Eden being geographically located by reference to four rivers, including the Tigris and the Euphrates. Some scholars hypothesize that Eden was located in Mesopotamia, which encompasses much of modern-day Iraq.

5D Connect with a flame : WELD

In the process of arc welding, metal is fused by the heat generated in an electrical arc. The welder uses two cables from an electrical power source. One cable is attached to the metal being welded, and the other to an electrode. The tip of the electrode is touched to the base metal causing a spark and an electrical arc. The electrode is held at an appropriate distance from the base metal to maintain the arc, which creates enough heat to melt the electrode and base metal.

6D Carrier that offered pioneering coast-to-coast service beginning in the 1930s : TWA

Back in 1930, when TWA was known as Transcontinental & Western Air (T&WA), the airline introduced one of the first passenger services between the east and west coasts of the US. Known as the Lindbergh Line, travel took about 36 hours and involved an overnight stay in Kansas City.

8D Specialized languages : ARGOTS

“Argot” is a French term. It is the name given in the 17th century to “the jargon of the Paris underworld”. Nowadays argot is a set of idioms used by any particular group, the “lingo” of that group.

9D Who wrote “Humankind cannot bear very much reality” : TS ELIOT

The author T. S. Eliot was the son of Henry Ware Eliot and Charlotte Champe Stearns, so his full name was Thomas Stearns Eliot (TSE).

Who wrote “Humankind cannot bear very much reality television” : BILL BUTLER …

10D Actor Millen of BBC America’s “Orphan Black” : ARI

Ari Millen is a Canadian actor who worked his way up to a regular role on the hit television show “Orphan Black”.

“Orphan Black” is a Canadian sci-fi TV show about several women who discover that they are in fact clones. Star of the show is Tatiana Maslany, who has what must be an exhausting job, playing all of the clones.

BTW, I am bingeing “Orphan Black” right now. Very good television …

13D Drink drunk the morning after, maybe : STALE BEER

Been there, done that …

14D Hidden assets : HOLE CARDS

“Stud poker” is the name given to many variants of poker, all of which are characterized by the dealer giving each player a mix of cards face-down and face-up. The cards facing upwards are called “upcards”. The cards facing downwards are called “hole cards”, cards only visible to the individual who holds that particular hand. This gives rise to the phrase “ace in the hole”, a valuable holding that only the player with the ace is aware of.

21D B to C, but not A to B : SEMITONE

I find that terminology in music can be confusing. My way of looking at an octave (my way … don’t shout at me!) is thinking of a piano keyboard. In the key of C, the seven notes of the octave are C, D, E, F, G, A, B (or “do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti”). These are all white keys. Most of these “white notes” are separated by whole tones, so there is room to add a “semitone” in between most of them, and these are the black keys (C-sharp for example). There is room for five black keys in an octave, and 7 + 5 adds up to 12. I assume we use the term “octave” because we often add an eighth note on the end “to bring us back to do” as the song says (do, re, mi, fa, sol, la, ti, do … or … C, D, E, F, G, A, B, C). That eighth note is really the first note in the next octave up.

24D Big mess : RAT’S NEST

Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, is credited with popularizing the elaborate hairstyle known as the pouf. The hair was styled using a pomade made from wholesome ingredients such as beef marrow and bear grease. Because of the complexity of the hairstyle, ladies wore it for a week or two, during which time the animal fat would become rancid. It was reported that vermin would be attracted to the hair while sleeping, which apparently led to the phrase “her hair is a rat’s nest”.

28D Rare showbiz collections : EGOTS

The acronym “EGOT” stands for “Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, Tony”, and is a reference to performers who have won all four awards.

32D Web master? : SPIDER-MAN

Spider-Man is a creation of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko, and first appeared in comics in 1962. He was a somewhat groundbreaking character in that his alter ego was a teenage high school student (Peter Parker), which marked the first time that a young person featured front and center as the superhero.

39D Phenomenon brought about by seasonal wind shifts : MONSOON

The term “monsoon” was first used in India in the days of the British Raj, when it described the seasonal winds that brought rain from the Bay of Bengal and the Arabian Sea from June to September. “Monsoon” is derived from the Portuguese “monção”, which in turn comes from the Arabic “mawsim” meaning “season”.

42D Demand upon reaching an “enemy border” : KING ME!

In the game of checkers, when a “man” reaches the other side of the board, it is promoted to “king”. The king is designated by placing a second piece on top of the first.

46D Some pilgrims : HAJIS

“Haji” (also “Hajji” and “Hadji”) is the term used for someone who has made a pilgrimage to Mecca, and it is sometimes also used as a form of address for such a person. The journey itself goes by the name “haj”, “hajj” or “hadj”.

52D Powdered ingredient in sweet teas and smoothies : TARO

Taro is a root vegetable that is grown for its edible underground plant stems (corms). The English name “taro” is borrowed from the Maori language of New Zealand. The same plant is known as “gabi” in the Philippines, “arbi” in much of India, and “jimbi” in parts of Africa where Swahili is spoken.

54D Farmer’s market alternative, in brief : CSA

Community Supported Agriculture (CSA)

56D Result of the ’64 Clay/Liston fight : TKO

Muhammad Ali fought Sonny Liston for the World Heavyweight Championship twice. The first bout was in 1964 in Miami, and the second in 1965 in Lewiston, Maine. In the first fight, Liston failed to come out of his corner for the seventh round. On seeing this, Ali (or “Cassius Clay” as he was then) ran to the ropes yelling “I’m the greatest!” and “I shook up the world”.