LA Times Crossword Answers 4 Jul 2018, Wednesday

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Constructed by: Jeffrey Wechsler
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Reveal Answer: Acting Awards

Happy Fourth of July, everyone. Themed answers each include the name of an acting award as a hidden word:

  • 53A. They’re “presented” in 20-, 28- and 46-Across : ACTING AWARDS
  • 20A. “What a terrifying experience!” : I WAS SO SCARED! (hiding “Oscar”)
  • 28A. “Love to everyone!” : GIVE THEM MY BEST (hiding “Emmy”)
  • 46A. Leave the firm to work solo : GO OUT ON YOUR OWN (hiding “Tony”)

Bill’s time: 6m 45s

Bill’s errors: 0

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Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5. Place for a panel : DAIS

A dais is a raised platform for a speaker. The term “dais” comes from the Latin “discus” meaning a “disk-shaped object”. I guess that the original daises had such a shape.

14. “Gray’s Anatomy,” for one : TOME

“Tome” first came into English from the Latin “tomus” which means “section of a book”. The original usage in English was for a single volume in a multi-volume work. By the late 16th century, “tome” had come to mean “large book”.

“Gray’s Anatomy” is a very successful human anatomy textbook that was first published back in 1858 and is still in print today. The original text was written by English anatomist Henry Gray, who gave his name to the work. The TV medical drama “Grey’s Anatomy” (note “Grey” vs. Gray”) is centered on the character Dr. Meredith Grey, but the show’s title is a nod to the title of the famous textbook.

15. Austen novel : EMMA

Jane Austen’s novel “Emma” is the tale of Emma Woodhouse and the wonderful George Knightley. At the end of the story, Emma marries Knightley and her young friend Harriet marries Robert Martin, who had been trying to get Harriet’s attention practically from page one of the novel.

16. Four-page sheet : FOLIO

Some common book formats/sizes are folio, octavo and quarto. For an octavo book for example, sixteen pages of text are printed, eight pages on each side of a “full-size” piece of paper. The pages are formed by folding the sheet of paper three times in half, giving a group of sixteen pages printed on eight leaves (after separation). The size of the resulting pages of course depends on the size of the original sheet, but each page is one eighth the size of that original (hence the name octavo). Nowadays the octavo size refers to books that are between eight and ten inches tall. If you do the math, octavo books are then twice the size of quarto, and folio twice the size of folio.

17. Wilson of “Father Figures” : OWEN

The actor Owen Wilson was nominated for an Oscar, but not for his acting. He was nominated for co-writing the screenplay for “The Royal Tenenbaums” along with Wes Anderson.

“Father Figures” is a 2017 starring Owen Wilson and Ed Helms as fraternal twin brothers who go on a quest to find their biological father. I saw this one, and wasn’t that impressed.

19. “Poems are made by fools like me” poem : TREES

The American journalist and poet Joyce Kilmer is primarily known for his 1913 poem titled “Trees”. The original text of the poem is:

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

Kilmer died a few years after writing “Trees”. He was a casualty of the Second Battle of the Marne in 1918 at the age of 31.

20. “What a terrifying experience!” : I WAS SO SCARED! (hiding “Oscar”)

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) is the organization that gives the annual Academy Awards also known as the “Oscars”. The root of the name “Oscar” is hotly debated, but what is agreed is that the award was officially named “Oscar” in 1939. The first Academy Awards were presented at a brunch in 1929 with an audience of just 29 people. The Awards ceremony is a slightly bigger event these days …

23. __ Major: constellation : CANIS

Canis Major is Latin for “greater dog”, and is the constellation containing the brightest star in the night sky, Sirius. Because of its location in Canis Major, Sirius is also known as the Dog Star.

24. Fitting : APROPOS

“Apropos”, meaning “relevant, opportune”, comes into English directly from French, in which language “à propos” means “to the purpose”. Note that we use the term as one word (apropos), whereas the original French is two words (à propos).

28. “Love to everyone!” : GIVE THEM MY BEST (hiding “Emmy”)

The Emmy Awards are the television equivalent of the Oscars from the world of film, the Grammy Awards in music and the Tony Awards for the stage. Emmy Awards are presented throughout the year, depending on the sector of television being honored. The most famous of these ceremonies are the Primetime Emmy Awards and the Daytime Emmy Awards. The distinctive name of “Emmy” is a softened version of the word “immy”, the nickname given to the video camera tubes found in old television cameras.

32. Summer on the Seine : ETE

The Seine is the river that flows through Paris. The Seine empties into the English Channel to the north, at the port city of Le Havre.

33. Sch. term : SEM

“Semester” is a German word from the Latin “semestris”, an adjective meaning “of six months”. We use the term in a system that divides an academic year into two roughly equal parts. A trimester-system has three parts, and a quarter-system has four.

34. Author Joyce Carol __ : OATES

Joyce Carol Oates is a remarkable writer, not just for the quality of her work (her 1969 novel “them” won a National Book Award, for example) but also for how prolific is her output. She published her first book in 1963 and since then has published over fifty novels as well as many other written works.

35. Arctic deer : CARIBOU

“Caribou” is the North American name for “reindeer”.

38. Org. providing creature comfort? : ASPCA

Unlike most developed countries, the US has no umbrella organization with the goal of preventing cruelty to animals. Instead there are independent organizations set up all over the nation using the name SPCA. Having said that, there is an organization called the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) that was originally intended to operate across the country, but really it now focuses its efforts in New York City.

42. Sue Grafton’s “__ for Lawless” : L IS

Sue Grafton wrote detective novels, and her “alphabet series” feature the private investigator Kinsey Millhone. She started off with “A Is for Alibi” in 1982 and worked her way up to “U is for Undertow” before she passed away in 2017.

43. “Cats” monogram : TSE

“Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” is a 1939 collection of poems by T. S. Eliot. The collection of whimsical poetry was a favorite of composer Andrew Lloyd Webber when he was a child. Webber used Eliot’s poems as inspiration for this megahit musical “Cats”.

46. Leave the firm to work solo : GO OUT ON YOUR OWN (hiding “Tony”)

The Tony Awards are more completely referred to as the Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre. The awards are named for Mary Antoinette “Tony” Perry, who was a co-founder of the American Theatre Wing.

51. “There is __ in the affairs of men”: Brutus : A TIDE

Something is said “to tide one over” if it (often money) will see one through a rough patch. The idea behind the expression is that a swelling tide can carry you over an obstacle without effort on your part, as perhaps a reserve fund might keep the lenders from your door. The use of “tide” in this sense might come from some famous lines spoken by Brutus in “Julius Caesar” by William Shakespeare

There is a Tide in the affairs of men,
Which taken at the Flood, leads on to Fortune

57. Sprint, e.g. : TELCO

A telco is a telecommunications company.

The company that we know today as Sprint has a history that is linked with the Southern Pacific railroad company. Southern Pacific developed a microwave communication system for its internal use across its network using rights-of-way associated with the company’s extensive railway lines. In the early seventies, the company laid huge lengths of fiber optic cable in those rights-of-way, alongside the tracks, primarily for internal use. The railroad sold excess fiber capacity to private companies, allowing those companies to operate long distance telephone service outside of AT&T, which at that time had a long-distance monopoly. Southern Pacific took advantage of changing FCC regulations and started offering voice service directly to consumers. That service was offered under the name SPRINT, an acronym that stood for Southern Pacific Railroad Internal Networking Telephony. Very interesting …

62. First stringers : A-TEAM

We’ve been using the phrases “first string” and “second string” in athletics since the mid-19th century. The expressions come from archery, in which a competitor would carry a second bowstring in case the first bowstring broke.

63. Quasimodo creator : HUGO

The title character in Victor Hugo’s novel “The Hunchback of Notre-Dame” is Quasimodo, the hunchbacked bell-ringer . Quasimodo falls for the beautiful Roma girl Esmeralda, and eventually rescues her just before she is due be hanged. He carries Esmeralda into Notre-Dame crying out “Sanctuary!” There is some recent evidence that a hunchbacked stone carver, working at Notre-Dame at the same time Hugo was alive, may have been the inspiration for the Quasimodo the bell-ringer.

64. Head, in Le Havre : TETE

Le Havre is a city on the mouth of the river Seine on the northwest coast of France. The city’s name translates as “The Haven”.

65. Muckety-muck : NABOB

A nabob is a person of wealth and prominence. “Nabob” was once used as a title for a governor in India.

67. River of central Germany : EDER

The Eder is a river in Germany, and a tributary of the Fulda River. The Eder has a dam near the small town of Waldeck which holds water in the large Edersee reservoir. This was one of the dams that was attacked by the RAF during WWII with the famous Barnes Wallis bouncing bombs. It was destroyed in the Dam Busters raid in 1943, but rebuilt the same year.

Down

1. Unlikely to become overwrought : STOIC

Zeno of Citium was a Greek philosopher famous for teaching at the Stoa Poikile, the “Painted Porch”, located on the north side of the Ancient Agora of Athens. Because of the location of his classes, his philosophy became known as stoicism (from “stoa”, the word for “porch”). And yes, we get our adjective “stoic” from the same root.

2. Like a McJob, typically : LOW-WAGE

“McJob” is a slang term for a low-paying position that offers little chance for advancement. The term of course comes from front-line jobs at a McDonald’s fast-food restaurant.

6. Iowa college city : AMES

Iowa State University of Science and Technology (ISU) is located in Ames, Iowa. Among many other notable milestones, ISU created the country’s first school of veterinary medicine, in 1879. The sports teams of ISU are known as the Cyclones.

8. Arabic for “peace” : SALAAM

The word “salaam” is an Anglicized spelling of the Arabic word for “peace”. The term can describe an act of deference, and in particular a very low bow.

10. Andalusian city : CORDOBA

Córdoba is a city in Andalusia in southern Spain that is sometimes referred to as “Cordova” in English. Córdoba might the right destination for anyone seeking out a warm vacation spot in Spain. The city has the highest average summer temperatures in the whole of Europe.

Andalusia (“Andalucía” in Spanish) is one of the seventeen autonomous communities in the Kingdom of Spain, and is the most southerly. The capital of Andalusia is the old city of Seville. The name Andalusia comes from its Arabic name, Al-Andalus, reflecting the region’s history as the center of Muslim power in Iberia during medieval times.

11. Martinique, par exemple : ILE

The island of Martinique in the eastern Caribbean is actually a part of France, and is referred to as an “overseas department”. As such, Martinique is part of the European Union and even uses the euro as its currency. The island is fully represented in the French National Assembly and Senate, just like any department within France. It’s sort of like the status of Hawaii within the US.

13. Coast Guard pickup : SOS

The combination of three dots – three dashes – three dots, is a Morse signal first introduced by the German government as a standard distress call in 1905. The sequence is remembered as the letters SOS (three dots – pause – three dashes – pause – three dots), although in the emergency signal there is no pause between the dots and dashes, so SOS is in effect only a mnemonic. Similarly, the phrases “Save Our Souls” and “Save Our Ship” are also mnemonics, introduced after the “SOS” signal was adopted.

22. LP’s 33 1/3 : RPM

The first vinyl records designed to play at 33⅓ rpm were introduced by RCA Victor in 1931, but were discontinued due to quality problems. The first long play (LP) 33⅓ rpm disc was introduced by Columbia Records many years later in 1948, with RCA Victor following up with a 45 rpm “single” the following year, in 1949.

26. Sugar suffix : -OSE

Sugars are usually named using the “-ose” suffix e.g., glucose, fructose, sucrose.

27. GPS lines : STS

Street (st.)

29. Safety org. with “Travel Tips” blog posts : TSA

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) is the agency that employs the good folks that check passengers and baggage at airports.

30. Part of HMS : HER

The ship prefix “HMS” is used by the warships of the Royal Navy, and stands for “Her/His Majesty’s Ship/Submarine”. The prefix “RMS” is used by ships of the merchant navy, and stands for “Royal Mail Ship/Steamer”.

31. First name in American poetry : EMILY

Emily Dickinson wrote nearly 1800 poems in her lifetime, with less than a dozen published before she died in 1886. Emily’s younger sister discovered the enormous collection, and it was published in batches over the coming decades.

35. Ancient underground tunnel : CATACOMB

There is a basilica in Rome called “San Sebastiano fuori le mura” (Saint Sebastian outside the walls), which is also known as “San Sebastiano ad Catacumbas” (Saint Sebastian at the Catacombs). It’s not known whether catacombs in general derive their name from this location, or whether the church took the name from an earlier term “catacombs”. However, it is known that these Roman underground passageways were the first subterranean cemeteries to be referred to as “catacombs”.

37. Stillwater sch. : OSU

The city of Stillwater, Oklahoma is located in the north-central part of the state, and in the area that is sometimes known as “Tornado Alley”. One of the city’s claims to fame is that it is home to Oklahoma State University.

40. “The Tell-Tale Heart” author : POE

Edgar Allan Poe’s story “The Tell-Tale Heart” is arguably one of his most disturbing works. It is a story of cold-blooded and premeditated murder, with some dismemberment thrown in for good measure.

41. Mai tai liqueur : CURACAO

The liqueur known as Curaçao comes from the island of Curaçao in the southern Caribbean. The liqueur is usually given artificial coloring to make it suitable for use in exotic cocktails. The common colors used are blue and orange.

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. “Maita’i” is the Tahitian word for “good”.

44. Moved like a dust devil : SWIRLED

Dust devils are like miniature versions of tornadoes. They are vertically-oriented columns of rotating air that pull dust from the ground, allowing them to be spotted quite easily.

47. Baseball legend Mel : OTT

At 5′ 9″, baseball legend Mel Ott weighed just 170 lb (I don’t think he took steroids!) and yet he was the first National League player to hit over 500 home runs. Sadly, Ott died in a car accident in New Orleans in 1958 when he was only 49 years old. And, according to Wikipedia, “Ott’s name frequently appears in crossword puzzles, on account of its letter combination and brevity.” True that …

49. Like fish in ceviche : RAW

Ceviche is a raw seafood dish that is popular in South and Central America. Ceviche is typically made from fish marinated in lemon or lime juice and spiced with hot peppers.

52. Fragrant compound : ESTER

Esters are very common chemicals. The smaller, low-molecular weight esters are usually pleasant smelling and are often found in perfumes. At the other end of the scale, the higher-molecular weight nitroglycerin is a nitrate ester and is very explosive, and polyester is a huge molecule and is a type of plastic. Fats and oils found in nature are fatty acid esters of glycerol known as glycerides.

57. Khaki kin : TAN

“Khaki” is an Urdu word that translates literally as “dusty”. The word was adopted for its current use as the name of a fabric by the British cavalry in India in the mid-1800s.

58. Landing hr. calculation : ETA

Estimated time of arrival (ETA)

59. Isr. neighbor : LEB

Lebanon lies at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. The nation has a rich cultural history, and was home to the ancient civilization of Phoenicia. The name “Lebanon” derives from the Semitic word “lbn” meaning “white”, and is probably a reference to the snow that caps the mountain range known as Mount Lebanon, which parallels the Mediterranean coast.

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Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1. Error : SLIP
5. Place for a panel : DAIS
9. Chemistry lab fluids : ACIDS
14. “Gray’s Anatomy,” for one : TOME
15. Austen novel : EMMA
16. Four-page sheet : FOLIO
17. Wilson of “Father Figures” : OWEN
18. Ground corn, e.g. : MEAL
19. “Poems are made by fools like me” poem : TREES
20. “What a terrifying experience!” : I WAS SO SCARED! (hiding “Oscar”)
23. __ Major: constellation : CANIS
24. Fitting : APROPOS
28. “Love to everyone!” : GIVE THEM MY BEST (hiding “Emmy”)
32. Summer on the Seine : ETE
33. Sch. term : SEM
34. Author Joyce Carol __ : OATES
35. Arctic deer : CARIBOU
38. Org. providing creature comfort? : ASPCA
42. Sue Grafton’s “__ for Lawless” : L IS
43. “Cats” monogram : TSE
46. Leave the firm to work solo : GO OUT ON YOUR OWN (hiding “Tony”)
50. Run : OPERATE
51. “There is __ in the affairs of men”: Brutus : A TIDE
53. They’re “presented” in 20-, 28- and 46-Across : ACTING AWARDS
57. Sprint, e.g. : TELCO
60. Bearded critter : GOAT
61. Picket fence piece : SLAT
62. First stringers : A-TEAM
63. Quasimodo creator : HUGO
64. Head, in Le Havre : TETE
65. Muckety-muck : NABOB
66. Lose one’s cool : SNAP
67. River of central Germany : EDER

Down

1. Unlikely to become overwrought : STOIC
2. Like a McJob, typically : LOW-WAGE
3. “This is serious!” : I MEAN IT!
4. Thoughtful : PENSIVE
5. Sales rep’s aid : DEMO
6. Iowa college city : AMES
7. All-in-one Apple desktop : IMAC
8. Arabic for “peace” : SALAAM
9. Door holder’s words : AFTER YOU
10. Andalusian city : CORDOBA
11. Martinique, par exemple : ILE
12. Quit working : DIE
13. Coast Guard pickup : SOS
21. Chicago-to-Chattanooga dir. : SSE
22. LP’s 33 1/3 : RPM
25. Adoptee from the 38-Across, perhaps : PET
26. Sugar suffix : -OSE
27. GPS lines : STS
29. Safety org. with “Travel Tips” blog posts : TSA
30. Part of HMS : HER
31. First name in American poetry : EMILY
35. Ancient underground tunnel : CATACOMB
36. Sci. course : BIO
37. Stillwater sch. : OSU
38. In the past : AGO
39. Absorb, with “up” : SOP
40. “The Tell-Tale Heart” author : POE
41. Mai tai liqueur : CURACAO
43. How food may be salted : TO TASTE
44. Moved like a dust devil : SWIRLED
45. Last chance to catch a live show : END DATE
47. Baseball legend Mel : OTT
48. Paddock sounds : NEIGHS
49. Like fish in ceviche : RAW
52. Fragrant compound : ESTER
54. Soup or salad : NOUN
55. Wildly enthusiastic (over) : GAGA
56. Surmounting : ATOP
57. Khaki kin : TAN
58. Landing hr. calculation : ETA
59. Isr. neighbor : LEB

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