Tag: Subj. studied with the help of telescopes crossword clue

Bill’s time: 11m 50s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1A Onetime capital of the Mughal Empire : AGRA

Agra is a medieval city on the banks of the river Yamuna in India that was the capital of the Mughal Empire from 1556 to 1658. The city is home to three UNESCO World Heritage Sites:

• The Taj Mahal: the famous mausoleum built in memory of Mumtaz Mahal.
• Agra Fort: the site where the famous Koh-i-Noor diamond was seized.
• Fatehpur Sikri: a historic city that’s home to well-preserved Mughal architecture.

The Mughal Empire extended over much of the Indian subcontinent from 1526 to 1707.

15A “Pardon me,” in Padua : SCUSI

Padua is in northern Italy, and not far from Venice. The city has many claims to fame. For example, Galileo was one of the lecturers at the University of Padua, and William Shakespeare chose the city as the setting for his play “The Taming of the Shrew”.

17A Airline known for tight security : EL AL

El Al Israel Airlines is the flag carrier of Israel. The term “el al” translates from Hebrew as “to the skies”. The company started operations in 1948, with a flight from Geneva to Tel Aviv. Famously, El Al only operates six days a week, not flying on the Sabbath.

18A Continental products : TIRES

Those would be bicycle tires.

19A Disney character who asks “Have you ever met a shark?” : NEMO

“Finding Nemo” is a 2003 animated blockbuster from Pixar. The film was the winner of the Oscar that year for Best Animated Feature. Believe it or not, “Finding Nemo” is the best-selling DVD of all time and, until 2010’s “Toy Story 3”, it was the highest-grossing, G-rated movie at the box office.

23A Grand Ole ___ : OPRY

The Grand Ole Opry started out as a radio show in 1925 originally called the WSM “Barn Dance”. In 1927, the “Barn Dance” radio show was broadcast in a slot after an NBC production called “Musical Appreciation Hour”, a collection of classical works including Grand Opera. In a December show, the host of “Barn Dance” announced, “For the past hour, we have been listening to music taken largely from Grand Opera. From now on we will present the ‘Grand Ole Opry'”. That name was used for the radio show from then on.

24A Subj. studied with the help of telescopes : SETI

“SETI” is the name given to a number of projects searching for extraterrestrial life. The acronym stands for “search for extraterrestrial intelligence”. One of the main SETI activities is the monitoring of electromagnetic radiation (such as radio waves) reaching the Earth in the hope of finding a transmission from a civilization in another world.

25A Property owner subject to a legal claim : LIENEE

A lien is a right that one has to retain or secure someone’s property until a debt is paid. When an individual takes out a car loan, for example, the lending bank is usually a lien holder. The bank releases the lien on the car when the loan is paid in full.

28A Law derived from the Quran : SHARIA

Sharia law is the Islamic legal system that governs many things like crime, politics and economics as well as many aspects of personal behavior. Sharia law is based on the Quran as well as the Hadith, the latter being a set of opinions and life examples from the prophet Muhammad.

36A Savanna antelope : ELAND

The eland (plural “eland, elands”) is a large African antelope, in fact the largest antelope on the planet. Both male and female eland have horns, and those horns have a steady spiral ridge along their length.

37A Common street name : ELM

The most common street name in the US is “Second Street”. “First Street” comes in only at number three, and this is because many cities and towns forgo the use of “First” and instead go with “Main” or something more historical in nature. The spooky “Elm Street” appears on the list at number fifteen.

50A Actress Garr : TERI

Actress Teri Garr had a whole host of minor roles in her youth, including appearances in nine Elvis movies. Garr’s big break came with the role of Inga in “Young Frankenstein”, and her supporting role in “Tootsie” earned Garr an Academy Award nomination. Sadly, Teri Garr suffered from multiple sclerosis, and was a National Ambassador for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

59A Big name in laptops : ASUS

Asus is a Taiwanese manufacturer of computing and networking hardware. The company name was chosen as the last four letters of “Pegasus”, the winged horse of Greek mythology.

60A Only president not born in the continental U.S. : OBAMA

Despite rumors to the contrary, Barack Hussein Obama II was indeed born in Hawaii. Future US President Obama was born on August 4, 1961 at Kapi’olani Maternity & Gynecological Hospital in Honolulu.

62A Beginning of every Washington State ZIP code : NINE

ZIP codes were introduced in 1963. The acronym “ZIP” stands for “Zone Improvement Plan”, a name indicating that mail travels more efficiently when the codes are included in the postal address.

63A Steakhouse choice : FILET

The filet mignon cut of beef is taken from muscle in the back of the cow. That muscle is not load-bearing and contains very little connective tissue, which makes it more tender as meat. The name “filet mignon” translates as “tender/delicate slice”.

64A Like John Lennon on a 1981 Rolling Stone cover : NUDE

Annie Leibovitz is an outstanding photographer who is best known for her portraits of celebrities. Perhaps her most famous image is one taken of John Lennon and Yoko Ono for the cover of “Rolling Stone” magazine. It features Ono and Lennon lying together on the floor, with a nude Lennon kissing the cheek of a fully clothed Ono. Five hours after the photo was taken, Lennon was murdered outside the Dakota Building in Manhattan, where he lived.

Down

2D Anaheim ballplayers : ANGELS

The Anaheim Angels baseball team is today more correctly called the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (LAA). The “Angels” name dates back to 1961 when the team was founded in the “City of Angels”, Los Angeles. When the franchise moved to Anaheim in 1965 they were known as the California Angels, then the Anaheim Angels, and most recently the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim. The Angels are also known as “the Halos”.

4D Studs : STALLIONS

There are lots of terms to describe horses of different ages and sexes, it seems:

• Foal: horse of either sex that is less than one year old
• Yearling: horse of either sex that is one to two years old
• Filly: female horse under the age of four
• Colt: male horse under the age of four
• Gelding: castrated male horse of any age
• Stallion: non-castrated male horse four years or older
• Mare: female horse four years or older

9D Pastors’ concerns : PARISHES

A pastor is a minister or priest in some Christian traditions. “Pastor” is the Latin word for “shepherd”.

13D Carved part of a piece of jewelry : CAMEO

Cameo is a method of carving, often the carving of a gemstone or a piece of jewelry. The resulting image is in relief (sits proud of the background), whereas an engraved image would be produced by the similar carving method known as intaglio. Nowadays, the term “cameo” is used for any piece of oval-shaped jewelry that contains the image of a head, usually in profile (maybe even a photograph).

26D Traveler’s aid, familiarly : TRIPLE A

The American Automobile Association (AAA) is a not-for-profit organization focused on lobbying, provision of automobile servicing, and selling of automobile insurance. The AAA was founded in 1902 in Chicago and published the first of its celebrated hotel guides back in 1917.

27D Storage item on some ocean voyages : STEAMER TRUNK

Back in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, steamer trunks were the equivalent of our modern carry-on bags. They were containers for clothes and other belongings that had flat tops and low profiles so that they could fit under a bunk on a steamer (steam ship) or on a train. Steamer trunks usually contained a passenger’s essentials, with the bulk of the items stored in the main luggage.

30D Shoe polish brand : SHINOLA

Shinola was a brand of shoe polish that was on the market from 1877 until 1960. The brand name was acquired by Bedrock Manufacturing in 2011. We can’t get Shinola shoe polish anymore, but we can buy Shinola watches, bicycles and leather goods.

40D The Chicago Bulls had a pair of them in the 1990s : THREE-PEATS

The Chicago Bulls have won six NBA championships in the life of the franchise, all of them in the nineties. They won in the 1991, 1992 and 1993 seasons (a so-called “three-peat”), and then again in 1996, 1997 and 1998 (a second “three-peat”).

43D Hors d’oeuvre servers, maybe : HOSTESSES

An hors d’oeuvre is a first course in a meal. “Hors d’oeuvre” translates from French as “apart from the work”, which really means “not the main course”.

45D Shipping weight units : SHORT TONS

Here in the US, a ton is equivalent to 2,000 pounds. In the UK, a ton is 2,240 pounds. The UK unit is sometimes referred to as an Imperial ton, long ton or gross ton. Folks over there refer to the US ton then as a short ton. To further complicate matters, there is also a metric ton or tonne, which is equivalent to 2,204 pounds. Personally, I wish we’d just stick to kilograms …

49D Alaska native : ALEUT

The Aleuts live on the Aleutian Islands of the North Pacific, and on the Commander Islands at the western end of the same island chain. The Aleutian Islands are part of the United States, and the Commander Islands are in Russia.

55D Shipwreck locales, often : SHOALS

A shoal is an underwater ridge or bank that is covered with a material such as sand or silt.