Day: October 26, 2017

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Constructed by: Mark McClain
Edited by: Rich Norris

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Today’s Theme: Fans

Each of today’s themed clue is the same, namely “FAN”:

• 17A. FAN : RANGE HOOD DEVICE
• 26A. FAN : GEISHA ACCESSORY
• 43A. FAN : GO DOWN ON STRIKES
• 56A. FAN : ARDENT SUPPORTER

Bill’s time: 7m 05s

Bill’s errors: 0

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Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1. “The Hobbit” figure : DWARF

“The Hobbit, or There and Back Again” is a children’s fantasy novel by J. R. R. Tolkien that was popular from the time of its first publication in 1937. Included in the early awards for “The Hobbit” was a prize for best juvenile fiction from “The New York Herald Tribune”. Tolkien adapted his succeeding novel “The Lord of the Rings” to incorporate elements in “The Hobbit”, so that the two tales are very much related.

15. Grassy “pet” : CHIA

Chia is a flowering plant in the mint family. Chia seeds are an excellent food source and are often added to breakfast cereals and energy bars. There is also the famous Chia Pet, an invention of a San Francisco company. Chia Pets are terracotta figurines to which are applied moistened chia seeds. The seeds sprout and the seedlings become the “fur” of the Chia Pet.

20. Donkey Kong, e.g. : APE

The first video game featuring the ape called Donkey Kong was created in 1981. That first Donkey Kong game also introduced the world to the character known as Mario, four years before the game Super Mario Bros became such a big hit.

21. Tiny bit : IOTA

Iota is the ninth letter in the Greek alphabet. We use the word “iota” to portray something very small as it is the smallest of all Greek letters.

22. Gas in an arc lamp : XENON

Metal halide lamps that are called xenons don’t actually rely on the incorporated xenon gas to generate light. The xenon gas is added so that the lamp comes on “instantly”. Without the xenon, the lamp would start up rather like an older streetlamp, flickering and sputtering for a while before staying alight.

26. FAN : GEISHA ACCESSORY

The Japanese term “geisha” best translates as “artist” or “performing artist”.

34. Holy Week season : LENT

In the Christian tradition, the week running up to Easter Sunday is known as Holy Week. Holy Week includes Palm Sunday, Holy/Spy/Ash Wednesday, Holy/Maundy Thursday, Holy/Good Friday and Holy Saturday.

35. Menagerie : ZOO

A “menagerie” is a varied group, and particularly refers to a collection of wild or unusual animals. The term comes from the French “ménagerie”, which described housing for domestic animals.

36. Organa family royal : LEIA

The full name of the character played by Carrie Fisher in the “Star Wars” series of films is Princess Leia Organa of Alderaan, and later Leia Organa Solo. Leia is the twin sister of Luke Skywalker, and the daughter of Anakin Skywalker (aka “Darth Vader”) and Padmé Amidala. Leia is raised by her adoptive parents Bail and Breha Organa. She eventually marries Han Solo.

37. Outback youngsters : JOEYS

In Australia, male kangaroos are known by several names including bucks, boomers, jacks or old men. Females are called does, flyers, or jills. There seems to be just the one name for young kangaroos: joeys. A group of kangaroos might be called a mob, troop or court.

In Australia, the land outside of urban area is referred to as the outback or the bush. That said, I think that the term “outback” is sometimes reserved for the more remote parts of the bush.

41. Trombone’s symphonic neighbor : TUBA

The tuba is the lowest-pitched of all the brass instruments, and one of the most recent additions to the modern symphony orchestra (usually there is just one tuba included in an orchestral line-up). “Tuba” is the Latin word for “trumpet, horn”. Oom-pah-pah …

42. First two-time Nobelist : CURIE

Marie Curie lived a life of firsts. She was the first female professor at the University of Paris, the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, and indeed was the first person to win two Nobel prizes (in Physics in 1903, and in Chemistry in 1911). Most of Curie’s work was in the field of radioactivity, and was carried out in the days when the impact of excessive radiation on the human body was not understood. She died from aplastic anemia, caused by high exposure to radiation. To this day, Curie’s personal papers are kept preserved in lead-lined boxes as they are highly radioactive, even her personal cookbook.

43. FAN : GO DOWN ON STRIKES

That would be baseball.

49. “Star Wars” genre : SCI-FI

“Star Wars” is the highest-grossing film media franchise of all time, and the second highest-grossing media franchise in general. The highest-grossing media franchise? That would be “Pokémon”.

52. Contrary girl of rhyme : MARY

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, How does your garden grow? With silver bells, and cockle shells, And pretty maids all in a row.

63. Bigelow products : TEAS

The Bigelow Tea Company is a family-owned business that was founded in 1945 by Ruth C. Bigelow. The company is headquartered in in Fairfield, Connecticut, and owns America’s only tea plantation, which is located in Charleston, South Carolina.

65. Maker of iComfort mattresses : SERTA

Serta was founded in 1931 when a group of 13 mattress manufacturers came together, essentially forming a cooperative. Today, the Serta company is owned by eight independent licensees in a similar arrangement. Serta advertisements feature the Serta Counting Sheep. Each numbered sheep has a different personality, such as:

• #1 The Leader of the Flock
• #½ The Tweener
• #13 Mr. Bad Luck
• #53 The Pessimist
• #86 Benedict Arnold

Down

1. Swimmer Torres with 12 Olympic medals : DARA

Dara Torres is a US swimmer who has won twelve Olympic medals. Torres is also the only American swimmer to have competed in five Olympic Games, and is the oldest swimmer to have made it onto the Olympic team, at 41.

2. Sub alternative : WRAP

Those would be sandwiches, or similar.

4. Joplin work : RAG

Scott Joplin was a great American composer and pianist, the “King of Ragtime”. Joplin was born poor, into a laboring family in Texas. He learned his music from local teachers and started out his career as an itinerant musician, traveling around the American South. He found fame with the release of his 1899 composition “Maple Leaf Rag”, regarded as the foundation stone on which ragtime music was built. Joplin’s music, and ragtime in general, was rediscovered by the populous in the early seventies when it was used in the very successful movie “The Sting”.

6. Nova __ : SCOTIA

The Canadian province of Nova Scotia (NS) lies on the east coast of the country and is a peninsula surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean. The area was settled by Scots starting in 1621, and Nova Scotia is Latin for “New Scotland”.

9. Legal __ : PAD

Our paper sizes here in North America don’t conform with the standards in the rest of the world. ISO standard sizes used elsewhere were chosen so that the ratio of width to length is usually one to the square root of two. This mathematical relationship means that when you cut a piece of paper in two each half preserves the aspect ratio of the original, which can be useful in making reduced or enlarged copies of documents. Our standard size of “letter” (ltr., 8.5 x 11 inches) was determined in 1980 by the Reagan administration to be the official paper size for the US government. Prior to this, the “legal” size (8.5 x 14 inches) had been the standard, since 1921.

11. Mr. Wednesday’s real identity in “American Gods” : ODIN

“American Gods” is a 2001 fantasy novel by English author Neil Gaiman. The book has been adapted into a TV series, with the first season airing on Starz in 2017. It’s all about gods and mythological creatures in contemporary America. Not my cup of tea, although there is a leprechaun named Mad Sweeney in the mix …

12. Artistic style of L.A.’s Eastern Columbia Building : DECO

The 13-story Eastern Columbia Building in Downtown Los Angeles opened in 1930 after only 9 months of construction at a cost of $1.25 million. It originally housed the headquarters of the Eastern Outfitting Company and the Columbia Outfitting Company, hence the name. Back in 1930, there was a city-wide height limit for buildings set at 150 feet. That limit was waived to allow construction of the magnificent and massive clock tower that brings the edifice to a total height of 264 feet.

13. Churchill’s 1955 successor : EDEN

Sir Anthony Eden served as Britain’s Foreign Secretary during WWII, and then as Prime Minister from 1955-57. I think it’s fair to say that Eden doesn’t have a great reputation as a statesman. He was proud of his stance in favor of peace over war, so his critics characterized him as an appeaser. His major stumble on the world stage occurred with the Suez Crisis in 1956. Egypt’s President Nasser unilaterally nationalized the Suez Canal causing war to be declared on Egypt by Britain, France and Israel. Within a few months political pressure from the US and the USSR caused the allies to withdraw, bolstering Egypt’s national reputation. Eden never recovered from the loss of face at home, and it is felt that the stress even affected his health. Eden resigned in January 1957.

18. Hand-holding celebratory dance : HORA

The hora is a circle dance that originated in the Balkans. It was brought to Israel by Romanian settlers, and is often performed to traditional, Israeli folk songs. The hora (also horah) is a regular sight at Jewish weddings. Sometimes the honoree at an event is raised on a chair during the hora.

23. Where Vladivostok is : ASIA

Vladivostok is a Russian city in the very southeast of the country, located close to the borders with China and North korea. It is a port city, and is home to the Russian Pacific Fleet. Indeed, Vladivostok is the largest Russian port on the Pacific Ocean.

24. __-deucey : ACEY

Acey-deucey is a fast-played variant of backgammon. Apparently the game has been a favorite with members of the armed forces since the days of WWI.

26. Solzhenitsyn subject : GULAG

The Gulag was a government agency in the Soviet Union that administered forced labor camps. The term “gulag” was used for the camps themselves, especially when used for political dissidents. “GULag” is actually an acronym standing for the Russian “Chief Administration of Corrective Labor Camps and Colonies”.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, having spent many years in a Gulag labor camp, wrote his famous book “The Gulag Archipelago” that was published in the West in 1973.

27. Día de Reyes month : ENERO

In Spanish, “el año” (the year) starts in “enero” (January) and ends in “diciembre” (December).

The holiday in the Christian tradition known as the Epiphany falls on January 6th. In some Spanish-speaking countries, the Epiphany is known as “Día de los Reyes”, and in other as “Día de Reyes” (The Day of Kings).

30. Netflix drama set in a Missouri mountain resort : OZARK

“Ozark” is a TV crime show starring Jason Bateman and Laura Linney as a married couple that relocate from Chicago to the Missouri Ozarks. The couple fall foul of Mexican drug lord after a money laundering scheme goes awry. The show is set at lake resort in the Ozarks, although filming actually takes place at lakes in the Atlanta area in order to take advantage of tax breaks offered by the State of Georgia.

31. WWII riveter : ROSIE

Rosie the Riveter is a cultural icon that represented women working in factories across the country during WWII as part of the war effort. The term “Rosie the Riveter” first appeared as the title of a 1942 song that was a national hit. The image that we bring to mind today that supposedly depicts “Rosie” is a wartime poster with the words “We Can Do It!”, which shows a woman in blue overalls and a red and white polka-dot headscarf. However, this image was used by Westinghouse as an internal motivation tool only for a two-week period in 1943, and was never associated with the Rosie the Riveter persona. The “Rosie” association to that image came decades later, in the 1980s. The best-known WWII representation of Rosie the Riveter was a “Saturday Evening Post” cover drawn by Norman Rockwell in 1943. This image shows a female worker with a rivet gun, and a lunch box bearing the name “Rosie”.

32. Devices used with oxcarts : YOKES

A yoke is a wooden beam used between a pair of oxen so that they are forced to work together.

38. Flute’s symphonic neighbor : OBOE

In a common seating arrangement used by a symphony orchestra, the flautists sit beside the oboists and in front of the second violinists.

39. Sierra Club founder : MUIR

John Muir was a famous American naturalist, although he was born in Scotland. Muir founded the Sierra Club in 1892. He published “My First Summer in the Sierra” in 1911, which described one of Muir’s favorite places in the country, the Sierra Nevada range in California.

41. With “the,” East and West, in a Kipling ballad : TWAIN

“Twain” is an archaic word meaning “two”.

The phrase “never the twain shall meet” originated in a Rudyard Kipling poem from 1892. The full quotation is:

Oh, East is East, and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.

Kipling’s reference here is to the British (the “West”) and the people of India (the “East”), and the lack of understanding that existed between the two in the days of the Raj.

42. Colorful set : CRAYONS

We use the word “crayon” for a stick of colored wax used for drawing. The term was imported in the 16th century from French, in which language it means “pencil”.

46. Maryland athlete, familiarly : TERP

The sports teams of the University of Maryland are called the Maryland Terrapins, or “the Terps” for short. The name dates back to 1932 when it was coined by the the university’s president at the time, Curley Byrd. He took the name from the diamondback terrapins that are native to the Chesapeake Bay.

49. Cellar contents : SALT

A salt cellar is small bowl that sits on a table holding salt for the seasoning of food. They were popular before free-flowing salt became available in the early 1900s. Salt cellars have been almost completed displaced now by salt shakers.

50. First Nations tribe : CREE

“First Nations” is a term used in Canada describing the ethnicity of Native Americans who are neither Inuit nor Métis people.

52. Backless shoe : MULE

A mule is a shoe without a back and usually with a closed toe. The original mule was a shoe worn by the highest magistrates in Ancient Rome.

57. Power agcy. since 1933 : TVA

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) has to be one of America’s great success stories when it comes to economic development. Created in 1933, the TVA spearheaded economic development in the Tennessee Valley at the height of the Great Depression. Central to the success was the federally-funded construction of flood-control and electricity-generation facilities.

58. Jazz band staple : SAX

The saxophone was invented by Belgian Adolphe Sax. Sax developed lip cancer at one point in his life, and one has to wonder if his affliction was related to his saxophone playing (I am sure not!). I had the privilege of visiting Sax’s grave in the Cemetery of Montmartre in Paris a few years ago.

59. Landmark ’70s case anonym : ROE

Roe v. Wade was decided in a US District Court in Texas in 1970, and reached the Supreme Court on appeal. The basic decision by the Supreme Court was that a woman’s constitutional right to privacy applied to an abortion, but that this right had to be balanced with a state’s interest in protecting an unborn child and a mother’s health. The Court further defined that the state’s interest became stronger with each trimester of a pregnancy. So, in the first trimester the woman’s right to privacy outweighed any state interest. In the second trimester the state’s interest in maternal health was deemed to be strong enough to allow state regulation of abortion for the sake of the mother. In the third trimester the viability of the fetus dictated that the state’s interest in the unborn child came into play, so states could regulate or prohibit abortions, except in cases where the mother’s life was in danger. I’m no lawyer, but that’s my understanding of the initial Supreme Court decision …

An anonym is a person whose name is not given, one who retains “anonymity”.

Though the English court system does not use the term today, “John Doe” first appeared as the “name of a person unknown” in England in 1659, along with the similar “Richard Roe”. An unknown female is referred to as “Jane Doe”. Variants of “John Doe” are “Joe Blow” and “John Q. Public”.