LA Times Crossword Answers 30 Jan 13, Wednesday

CROSSWORD SETTER: Kurt Mengel & Jan-Michele Gianette
THEME: Football Team’s Association … each of today’s themed answers is the name of a football team followed by an verb that can be associated with the team name:

17A. New Orleans team confused? SAINTS BEDEVILED
26A. New York team punished? JETS GROUNDED
46A. Indianapolis team stymied? COLTS LASSOED
59A. San Diego team upset? CHARGERS SHOCKED

COMPLETION TIME: 08m 13s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Net help pages, briefly FAQS
Most websites have a page listing answers to Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ). There is a link to the LAXCrossword’s blog’s FAQ page at the top right of every page.

5. County counterpart, in Canterbury SHIRE
The word “shire” comes from the Old English “scir” meaning “administrative district”. The term was replaced with county as far back as the 14th century, but the usage persists to this day, largely because some counties retain the use of -shire as a suffix (Yorkshire, Lancashire etc.).

Canterbury is a city in the southeast of England in the county of Kent. Canterbury is famous for Canterbury Cathedral where Thomas Becket was murdered in 1170, making it a pilgrimage destination for Christians. It was one of these pilgrimages that was the inspiration for Geoffrey Chaucer’s “The Canterbury Tales” written in the 14th century.

14. Longtime Stern rival IMUS
Don Imus’s syndicated radio show “Imus in the Morning” broadcasts from New York City.

15. Little bits IOTAS
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.

16. Baltic capital RIGA
Riga is the capital city of Latvia. The historical center of Riga is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, declared as such because of the city’s magnificent examples of Art Nouveau architecture.

The Baltic is a sea in northern Europe that is much less saline than the oceans. The lower amount of salt in the Baltic partially explains why almost half of the sea freezes during the winter. In fact, the Baltic has been known to completely freeze over several times over the past few centuries.

17. New Orleans team confused? SAINTS BEDEVILED
The New Orleans Saints football team takes its name from the jazz song “When the Saints Go Marching In”, a tune that is very much associated with the city. The team was founded in 1967, on November 1, which is All Saints’ Day in the Roman Catholic tradition.

20. __ Who THE
The English rock band called the Who was formed in 1964, bringing together famed musicians Roger Daltrey, Pete Townshend, John Entwistle and Keith Moon. According to “Rolling Stone” magazine, the Who were the third arm of the holy trinity of British rock, alongside the Beatles and the Rolling Stones.

26. New York team punished? JETS GROUNDED
Just like the New York Giants, the New York Jets are based in New Jersey, headquartered in Florham Park. The Jets and the Giants have a unique arrangement in the NFL in that the two teams share the same stadium, the New Meadowlands in East Rutherford, New Jersey. The Jets were an AFL charter team, formed in 1959 as the Titans of New York. They changed their name to the Jets in 1963.

32. Picky eaters of rhyme SPRATS
Jack Sprat was a nickname given in the 16th century to people of small stature. Jack featured in a proverb of the day:

Jack will eat not fat, and Jull doth love no leane. Yet betwixt them both they lick the dishes cleane.

Over time, this mutated into a nursery rhyme that is still recited in England:

Jack Sprat could eat no fat. His wife could eat no lean. And so between them both, you see, they licked the platter clean.

36. “Network” director LUMET
Sidney Lumet passed away in April 2011. As a movie director Lumet had a great string of celebrated films to his name including “12 Angry Men”, “Dog Day Afternoon”, “Network” and “The Verdict”. Although nominated for the Academy Award for Best Director for each of these films, he never won an individual Oscar. However, the Academy gave him the recognition he deserved in 2004 by presenting Lumet with an Honorary Award.

The movie “Network” was released in 1976. It was directed by Sidney Lumet and stars Peter Finch in his final role, for which he won a posthumous Academy Award. That Oscar for Peter Finch was remarkable in that it was the first time the Best Actor award had been won after the actor passed away, and it was also the first time it had been won by an Australian.

39. Andrea Bocelli, e.g. TENOR
Andrea Bocelli is a classically-trained tenor who sings popular music, a so-called cross-over artist. Bocelli was born with poor eyesight and then became totally blind at the age of 12 when he had an accident playing soccer.

41. Half a fly TSE
Tsetse flies live on the blood of vertebrate mammals. The name “tsetse” comes from Tswana, a language of southern Africa, and translates simply as “fly”. Tsetse flies are famous for being carriers of the disease known as “sleeping sickness”. Sleeping sickness is caused by a parasite which is passed onto humans when the tsetse fly bites into human skin tissue. If one considers all the diseases transmitted by the insect, then the tsetse fly is responsible for a staggering quarter of a million deaths each year.

46. Indianapolis team stymied? COLTS LASSOED
The Indianapolis Colts professional football team has been in Indiana since 1984. The team traces its roots back to the Dayton Triangles, one of the founding members of the NFL created in 1913. The Dayton Triangles relocated and became the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1930, and then the Brooklyn Tigers in 1944. The team merged with the Boston Yanks in 1945, so then played in Boston. The Yanks were moved to New York in 1949, and then to Dallas in 1952 as the Dallas Texans. The Texan franchise moved to Baltimore in 1953, forming the Colts. The Colts made their last move, to Indianapolis, in 1984. Whew!

56. “Homeland” airer, briefly SHO
“Homeland” is a psychological drama shown on Showtime about a CIA officer who is convinced that a certain US Marine is a threat to the security of the United States. The show is based on a series from Israeli television called “Hatufim” (Prisoners of War”). I’m going to have to check this one out …

59. San Diego team upset? CHARGERS SHOCKED
The San Diego Chargers are an AFL charter team, so the franchise was founded in 1959. The Chargers played one season in Los Angeles and then moved to San Diego in 1961.

66. Fur fortune-maker ASTOR
John Jacob Astor was the father of the famous American Astor dynasty. He was the country’s first multi-millionaire, making his fortune in the trade of fur, real estate and opium. In today’s terms, it has been calculated that by the time of his death he has accumulated a fortune big enough to make him the fourth wealthiest man in American history (in the company of the likes of Andrew Carnegie, Cornelius Vanderbilt, Bill Gates, Henry Ford and John D. Rockefeller).

Down
2. Indian nursemaid AMAH
“Amah” is an interesting word in that we associate it so much with Asian culture and yet it actually comes from the Portuguese “ama” meaning “nurse”. Ama was imported into English in the days of the British Raj in India when a wet-nurse became known as an amah.

4. IRS ID SSN
The main purpose of a Social Security Number (SSN) is to track individuals for the purposes of taxation, although given its ubiquitous use, it is looking more and more like an “identity number” to me. The social security number system was introduced in 1936. Prior to 1986, an SSN was required only for persons with substantial income so many children under 14 had no number assigned. For some years the IRS had a concern that a lot of people were claiming children on their tax returns who did not actually exist. So, from 1986 onward, it is a requirement to get an SSN for any dependents over the ago of 5. Sure enough, in 1987 seven million dependents “disappeared”.

5. TV drama about Alex, Teddy, Georgie and Frankie Reed SISTERS
“Sisters” is a drama TV show that originally aired in the nineties. “Sisters” was groundbreaking television in that it was the first primetime show to focus on women and women’s issues.

6. Vagabond HOBO
No one seems to know for sure how the term “hobo” originated, although there are lots of colorful theories. My favorite is that “hobo” comes from the first letters in the words “ho-meward bo-und”, but it doesn’t seem very plausible. A kind blog reader tells me that according to Click and Clack from PBS’s “Car Talk” (a great source!), “hobo” comes from “hoe boy”. Hoe boys were young men with hoes looking for work after the Civil War. Hobos differed from “tramps” and “bums”, in that “bums” refused to work, “tramps” worked when they had to, while “hobos” traveled in search of work.

8. X-ray units RADS
A rad is a unit used to measure radiation levels that is largely obsolete now. The rad has been superseded by the rem.

24. Bone: Pref. OSTE-
The Greek word for “bone” is “osteon”.

27. Tall runners EMUS
The emu has had a tough time in Australia since man settled there. There was even an “Emu War” in Western Australia in 1932 when migrating emus competed with livestock for water and food. Soldiers were sent in and used machine guns in an unsuccessful attempt to drive off the “invading force”. The emus were clever, breaking their usual formations and adopting guerrilla tactics, operating as smaller units. After 50 days of “war”, the military withdrew. Subsequent requests for military help for the farmers were ignored. The emus had emerged victorious …

28. Footnote ref. OP CIT
Op. cit. is short for “opus citatum”, Latin for “the work cited”. Op. cit. is used in footnotes to refer the reader to an earlier citation. It is similar to “ibid”, except that ibid refers the reader to the last citation, the one immediately above.

29. Mount Narodnaya’s range URALS
The eastern side of the Ural Mountains in Russia is generally regarded as the natural divide between the continents of Europe and Asia.

Mount Narodnaya is the highest peak in the Ural Mountains, the famous Russian range.

30. __ orange NAVEL
Navel oranges are the ones with the small second fruit that grows at the base, at the “navel”. The navel orange has been traced back to a single mutation that took place in an orange tree in Brazil many years ago. The mutation also rendered the fruit seedless and hence sterile, so it is propagated using grafts.

35. Slave Scott DRED
Famously, the slave Dred Scott was unsuccessful in suing for his freedom in St. Louis, Missouri in 1857.

40. “Mi casa __ casa” ES SU
“Mi casa es su casa” translates from Spanish as “My home is your home”.

43. Gore and Hirt ALS
Al Gore was born in Washington DC, the son of Al Gore, Sr., then a US Representative for the state of Tennessee. After deferring his military service in order to attend Harvard, the younger Gore became eligible for the draft on graduation. Many of his classmates found ways of avoiding the draft, but Gore decided to serve and even took the “tougher” option of joining the army as an enlisted man. Actor Tommy Lee Jones shared a house with Gore in college and says that his buddy told him that even if he could find a way around the draft, someone with less options than him would have to go in his place and that was just wrong.

Al Hirt was a trumpeter and bandleader. Hirt’s most famous recordings were the song “Java” and the album “Honey in the Horn”.

46. Casual wine choices CHARDS
The Chardonnay grape is believed to have originated in the Burgundy wine region of France. Now it’s grown “everywhere”. Drinkers of California “Chards” seem to be particularly fond of “oak” flavor, so most Chardonnay wines are aged in oak barrels.

48. Modern witch’s religion WICCA
Wicca is a relatively new phenomenon, a Neopagan religion that developed in the twentieth century. A follower of Wicca is called a Wiccan or a Witch.

49. For this purpose AD HOC
The Latin phrase “ad hoc” means “for this purpose”.

54. Exam sophs may take PSAT
I think the acronym PSAT stands for Preliminary Scholastic Aptitude Test.

The term “sophomore” has been used for a student in the second year of university since the 1680’s. The original meaning of the word was “arguer”. The term has Greek roots, from two Greek words that have been artificially combined in English. The Greek “sophos” means “wise”, and “moros” means “foolish”.

58. Keats works ODES
The poet John Keats is famous for writing a whole series of beautiful odes. The most renowned are the so-called “1819 Odes”, a collection from the year 1819 that includes famous poems such as “Ode on a Grecian Urn”, “Ode to a Nightingale” and “Ode to Psyche”.

60. Org. concerned with greenhouse gas EPA
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was set up during the Nixon administration and began operation at the end of 1970.

61. Ally of Fidel CHE
Ernesto “Che” Guevara was born in Argentina, and in 1948 he started to study medicine at the University of Buenos Aires. While at school he satisfied his need to “see the world” by taking two long journeys around South America, the story of which are told in Guevara’s memoir later published as “The Motorcycle Diaries”. While travelling, Guevara was moved by the plight of the people he saw and their working conditions and what he viewed as capitalistic exploitation. In Mexico City he met brothers Raul and Fidel Castro and was persuaded to join their cause, the overthrow of the US-backed government in Cuba. He rose to second-in-command among the Cuban insurgents, and when Castro came to power Guevara was influential in repelling the Bay of Pigs Invasion and bringing Soviet nuclear missiles to the island. Guevara left Cuba in 1965 to continue his work as a revolutionary. He was captured by Bolivian forces in 1967, and was executed. Fidel Castro led the public mourning of Guevara’s death, and soon the revolutionary was an icon for many left-wing movements around the world.

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Net help pages, briefly FAQS
5. County counterpart, in Canterbury SHIRE
10. Boring BLAH
14. Longtime Stern rival IMUS
15. Little bits IOTAS
16. Baltic capital RIGA
17. New Orleans team confused? SAINTS BEDEVILED
20. __ Who THE
21. Little bits ATOMS
22. Silly INANE
23. Musical quality TONE
25. Chooses ELECTS
26. New York team punished? JETS GROUNDED
31. Fail to mention OMIT
32. Picky eaters of rhyme SPRATS
33. Different ODD
36. “Network” director LUMET
38. Old West mil. force CAV
39. Andrea Bocelli, e.g. TENOR
41. Half a fly TSE
42. More than a sobber WAILER
45. Small or large SIZE
46. Indianapolis team stymied? COLTS LASSOED
48. Loads to clean WASHES
51. Person in a sentence, say NOUN
52. Convention pin-on ID TAG
53. Heroic poems EPICS
56. “Homeland” airer, briefly SHO
59. San Diego team upset? CHARGERS SHOCKED
62. Hardly friendly COLD
63. Go on and on PRATE
64. Take on HIRE
65. Golf rarities ACES
66. Fur fortune-maker ASTOR
67. Football positions ENDS

Down
1. Punch source FIST
2. Indian nursemaid AMAH
3. Being alone with one’s thoughts QUIET TIME
4. IRS ID SSN
5. TV drama about Alex, Teddy, Georgie and Frankie Reed SISTERS
6. Vagabond HOBO
7. News piece ITEM
8. X-ray units RADS
9. Linguistic suffix -ESE
10. Pickled BRINED
11. Purple __: New Hampshire state flower LILAC
12. Word with travel or talent AGENT
13. Underworld HADES
18. Zippy flavor TANG
19. Most nasty VILEST
24. Bone: Pref. OSTE-
25. NH summer hours EDT
26. Quite a blow JOLT
27. Tall runners EMUS
28. Footnote ref. OP CIT
29. Mount Narodnaya’s range URALS
30. __ orange NAVEL
33. Thin paper ONION SKIN
34. Nap DOZE
35. Slave Scott DRED
37. Like many omelets TWO-EGG
40. “Mi casa __ casa” ES SU
43. Gore and Hirt ALS
44. Stock market VIP? RANCHER
46. Casual wine choices CHARDS
47. Not bad, not good SO-SO
48. Modern witch’s religion WICCA
49. For this purpose AD HOC
50. Old, as a joke STALE
53. Goofs ERRS
54. Exam sophs may take PSAT
55. Colon, in analogies IS TO
57. Sheep together HERD
58. Keats works ODES
60. Org. concerned with greenhouse gas EPA
61. Ally of Fidel CHE

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