LA Times Crossword Answers 2 Jul 13, Tuesday

CROSSWORD SETTER: Amy Johnson
THEME: Like Night or Nite … each of today’s themed answers is a common phrase but with the last word “abbreviated”, like “night” becoming “nite”, to suit the clue:

20A. Bad web designer’s product? NOT A PRETTY SITE (sight)
37A. Start the service ceremonially? LEAD WITH A RITE (right)
56A. Dieter’s hope when entering the brewpub? LET THERE BE LITE (light)

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 07m 44s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
1. Mama who sang with the Papas CASS
Cass Elliot was one of the four singers in the Mamas and the Papas, a sensational group from the sixties. Elliot was performing sold-out concerts in London in 1974 when she was found dead one morning, having had a heart attack. She was only 32 years old. Eerily, she died in the same flat (on loan from Harry Nilsson) in which the Who’s drummer, Keith Moon, would die just four years later.

5. Mercury and Saturn ORBS
Mercury is the smallest of the planets in our solar system, and is the nearest to the Sun. Mercury orbits the sun relatively rapidly compared to the other planets, and this fact may have led to it being given the name “Mercury”, the Roman deity who was the speedy messenger to the gods.

Saturn is easily visible from Earth with the unaided eye, but we need some help to see the planet’s famous rings. Galileo was the first person to see Saturn’s rings, when he turned his primitive telescope towards the night sky in 1610. However, he misinterpreted what he was observing and assumed that the rings were in fact two smaller planets located at either side of the larger Saturn.

14. Mercury or Saturn AUTO
“Mercury” is a marque used by the Ford Motor Company. The brand was introduced by Edsel Ford, son of Henry, in 1938. Mercury was intended to be a line of vehicles more luxurious than the Ford line of cars yet more affordable vehicles in the Lincoln series.

18. Pincushion alternative ETUI
An etui is an ornamental case used to hold small items, in particular sewing needles. We imported both the case design and the word “etui” from France. The French also have a modern usage of “etui”, using the term to depict a case for carrying CDs.

19. Maternally related ENATE
Something that is enate is growing outward, and “enate” is used to describe ancestors related on the mother’s side. Something that is agnate comes from a common source, and “agnate” is used to describe relatives on the father’s side of the family tree.

25. Hanoi holiday TET
The full name for the New Year holiday in Vietnam is Tet Nguyen Dan, meaning “Feast of the First Morning”. Tet usually falls on the same day as Chinese New Year.

Hanoi was the capital of North Vietnam, and Saigon the capital of South Vietnam. After the Vietnam War, Hanoi was made capital of the reunified state and Saigon, the larger metropolis, was renamed to Ho Chi Minh City.

26. Sandwich shop letters BLT
The BLT (bacon, lettuce and tomato) is the second most popular sandwich in the US, after the plain old ham sandwich.

30. Heavy herbivore RHINO
There are five types of rhinoceros that survive today, and the smaller Javan Rhino is the most rare. The rhinoceros is probably the rarest large mammal on the planet, thanks to poaching. Hunters mainly prize the horn of the rhino as it is used in powdered form in traditional Chinese medicine.

32. Greek goddess of the dawn EOS
(2D. Roman goddess of the dawn AURORA)
In Greek mythology, Eos is the goddess of the dawn who lived at the edge of the ocean. Eos would wake each morning to welcome her brother Helios the sun. The Roman equivalent of Eos is Aurora.

33. Coll. dorm mentors RAS
RAs are resident assistants or resident advisers, the peer leaders found in residence halls, particularly on a college campus.

35. Essen-to-Leipzig direction OST
“Ost” is German for “east”.

I knew a man back in Ireland, a German national from the city of Essen. He had very sad tales to tell from the days of WWII. As a young boy he lost his (socialist) parents during the Nazi purges early in the war. In 1943 he was living with his grandmother and still attending school when he was drafted into the army along with the rest of his class (at 14 years of age). His platoon leader was his school teacher who made a point of tutoring the boys in place of military drilling. One day he was on guard duty with his class/platoon at the dam above the city, and along come the Dam Busters with their bouncing bombs. The raid was successful (from the perspective of the Allies), but he described terrible famine faced by the people below the dam due to flooding of the farmland that surrounded the factories.

Leipzig is a city in Germany located just under 100 miles south of Berlin. The name “Leipzig” comes from the Slavic word ”Lipsk” which means “settlement where the linden trees stand”. Linden trees are also called lime trees and basswood trees.

36. Food for Fido ALPO
Alpo is a brand of dog food first produced by Allen Products in 1936, with “Alpo” being an abbreviation for “Allen Products”. Lorne Greene used to push Alpo in television spots, as did Ed McMahon and Garfield the Cat, would you believe?

41. “Roger that” COPY
The term “roger”, meaning “yes” or “acknowledged”, comes from the world of radiotelephony. The British military used a phonetic alphabet in the fifties that included “Roger” to represent the letter “R”. As such, it became customary to say “Roger” when acknowledging a message, with R (Roger) standing for “received”.

42. Keats wrote one to a nightingale ODE
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”.

43. Funnyman Caesar SID
Sid Caesar achieved fame in the fifties on TV’s “Your Show of Shows”. To be honest, I know Sid Caesar mainly from the fun film version of the musical “Grease”, in which he played Coach Calhoun.

44. Prefix with duct OVI-
Oviducts are the non-mammalian equivalents of the Fallopian tubes. Eggs travel from the ovaries, along the oviduct (there are usually two oviducts, but sometimes only one) and are released into some other organ or anatomical structure depending on species.

45. Melbourne marsupial KOALA
The koala really does look like a little bear, but it’s not even closely related. The koala is an arboreal marsupial and a herbivore, native to the east and south coasts of Australia. Koalas aren’t primates, and are one of the few mammals other than primates who have fingerprints. In fact, it can be very difficult to tell human fingerprints from koala fingerprints, even under an electron microscope.

Marsupials are mammals that carry their young in a pouch. Better-known marsupials are kangaroos, koalas, wombats and Tasmanian devils. As you can perhaps tell from this list, most marsupials are native to the Southern Hemisphere.

52. Shimon Peres’s land: Abbr. ISR
Shimon Peres is an Israeli statesman who was born in Poland. A former prime minister, Peres is the current President of the State of Israel. He is 89 years old, making him the oldest head of state in the world.

53. Cosmo, e.g. MAG
“Cosmopolitan” magazine was first published way back in 1886! It started out life as a family magazine, then as a literary publication. “Cosmo” took its present form as a women’s magazine in the sixties.

62. Crack pilots ACES
A flying ace is an aviator who has shot down a number of enemy planes during combat. The qualifying number of kills seems to vary, but five is common. The first use of “ace” was during WWI when the French newspapers dubbed pilot Adolphe Pegoud “l’as” (French for “the ace”) when he shot down his fifth German plane.

63. Flambé AFIRE
“Flambé” is the French word for “flamed”, and was originally a term used to describe certain types of porcelain. It crept into cookery just after 1900.

64. Laos location ASIA
The official name for the country of Laos is the Lao People’s Democratic Republic. In the Lao language, the country’s name is “Meuang Lao”. The French ruled Laos as part of French Indochina, having united three separate Lao kingdoms. As there was a plural of “Lao” entities united into one, the French added the “S” and so today we tend to use “Laos” instead of “Lao”.

Down
1. It makes a feline frisky CATNIP
About 50% of all cats are affected in some way by the plant catnip. There is a terpenoid in the oil of the plant called nepetalactone that the cat inhales and that can cause anything from drowsiness to anxiety.

4. Dream-inducing “Brave New World” drug SOMA
In Aldous Huxley’s 1931 masterpiece, “Brave New World”, the members of his future society are encouraged to partake of the drug called soma. The soma provides hangover-free escapes referred to as “holidays”.

5. Puccini work OPERA
Giacomo Puccini is was an Italian composer, famous for his operas that are so often performed all over the world. Included in the list of his works are “La bohème”, “Tosca”, “Madama Butterfly” and “Turandot”. Puccini died in Brussels, Belgium in 1924 having suffered from throat cancer. An audience attending a performance of “La bohème” in Rome heard of the composer’s death in the middle of the performance. At the news, the opera was stopped, and the orchestra instead played Chopin’s “Funeral March”.

6. Like slasher films, typically RATED R
The Motion Picture Association of America’s (MPAA) film-rating system (R, PG-17, G etc.) is purely voluntary and is not backed by any law. Movie theaters agree to abide by the rules that come with the MPAA ratings in exchange for access to new movies.

7. Champagne designation BRUT
Sparkling wines can be classified according to sweetness. These classifications are, from driest to sweetest:

– Brut Nature
– Extra Brut
– Brut
– Extra Dry
– Dry
– Semi-Dry
– Sweet

11. “Click It or Ticket” device SEAT BELT
There is only one state in the US that does not require drivers to wear seat belts by law, and that is New Hampshire.

12. Range playmate of song ANTELOPE
The words of “Home on the Range” came before the music, a poem called “My Western Home” from the 1870s written by a Dr. Brewster Higley of Kansas. The music was added by Daniel Kelley, a friend of Higley. And now, a version of the song is the state song of Kansas.

13. JFK’s predecessor DDE
President Eisenhower was born in Denison, Texas and given the name David Dwight Eisenhower, but by the time he made it to the White House he was going by the name Dwight D. Eisenhower. Growing up, his family called him Dwight, and when “Ike” enrolled in West Point he himself reversed the order of his given names.

John F. Kennedy was the 35th President of the US, and the fourth US president to have been assassinated in office. The previous three presidents who were killed in office were Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield and William McKinley.

22. Grapevine starters? YENTAS
Yenta (also “Yente”) is actually a female Yiddish name. In Yiddish theater “yenta” came to mean a busybody.

27. Chinese menu surname TSO
General Tso’s chicken is an American creation, often found on the menu of a Chinese restaurant. The name General Tso may be a reference to General Zuo Zongtang of the Qing Dynasty, but there is no clear link.

31. Monopoly miniature HOTEL
The commercial game of Monopoly is supposedly a remake of “The Landlord’s Game” created in 1903 by a Quaker woman called Lizzie Phillips. Phillips used her game as a tool to explain the single tax theory of American economist Henry George. The Landlord’s Game was first produced commercially in 1924. The incredibly successful derivative game called Monopoly was introduced in 1933 by Charles Darrow, who became a very rich man when Parker Brothers bought the rights to the game just two years later in 1935.

34. “Just Do It” logo SWOOSH
I remember seeing Carolyn Davidson on the television show “I’ve Got a Secret”. She created the Nike “swoosh” back in 1971 when she was a design student at Portland State. She did it as freelance work for Blue Ribbon Sports, a local company introducing a new line of athletic footwear. The “swoosh” is taken from the wing of the Greek goddess of victory, Nike. Years later, BRS changed its name to Nike, so I suppose the company should be grateful to Carolyn for both the great design, and a great company name.

36. Guy or gal Friday AIDE
In Daniel Defoe’s 1719 novel “Robinson Crusoe”, the castaway encounters a companion that Crusoe calls “Friday”, because the two first met on that day. Friday soon becomes his willing servant. This character is the source of our terms “Man Friday” and “Girl Friday”, which are used to describe a particularly competent and loyal assistant.

38. Serious flu outbreak, e.g. EPIDEMIC
Influenza is an ailment that is caused by a virus. The virus is readily inactivated by the use of soap, so washing hands and surfaces is especially helpful in containing flu outbreaks.

40. Blue __ Mountains RIDGE
The Blue Ridge Mountains are part of the Appalachian Mountains in the eastern US. The range is noted for the bluish colors of the peaks. The blue hue is actually caused by the emission of an organic compound called isoprene into the atmosphere. The isoprene contributes to the blue haze that covers mountain ranges.

41. Chick-fil-A spokescritter COW
Chick-fil-A is a chain of fast food restaurants that was founded in 1946 in Georgia. The corporation has a culture that is heavily influenced by the founder’s evangelical Christian faith. As such, Chick-fil-A is one of the only fast food or retail chain of stores that closes for business on Sunday. Chick-fil-A also made the headlines recently due to the company’s stated opposition to same-sex marriage.

46. Earhart in the air AMELIA
Amelia Earhart is as famous today as she was during her lifetime. When she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic she was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross by Congress, and the Cross of Knight of the Legion of Honor by the French government. She made two attempts to circumnavigate the globe by air (not solo). Her first attempt in March 1937 had to be abandoned when her aircraft was damaged during takeoff. The second attempt in June/July of the same year ended when Earhart and her navigator disappeared flying from Lae, New Guinea to Howland Island in the Central Pacific.

48. Chinese martial art TAI CHI
More properly called tai chi chuan, tai chi is a martial art mostly practiced to improve overall health and increase longevity.

50. Monkey used in research RHESUS
The Rhesus macaque is also known as the Rhesus monkey. As it is widely available and is close to humans anatomically and physically, the Rhesus macaque has been used in scientific research for decades. The Rhesus monkey was used in the development of rabies, smallpox and polio vaccines, and it also gave its name to the Rhesus factor that is used in blood-typing. It was also Rhesus monkeys that were launched into space by the US and Soviet space programs. Humans and macaques share about 93% of their DNA and had a common ancestor about 25 million years ago.

54. “Fuzzy Wuzzy was __” A BEAR
“Fuzzy Wuzzy” is a novelty song for children that dates back to 1944.

Fuzzy Wuzzy was a bear
Fuzzy Wuzzy had no hair
Fuzzy Wuzzy wasn’t fuzzy, was he?

57. Luau staple TARO
The corm of some taro plants is used to make poi, the traditional Hawaiian dish (that I think tastes horrible). When a taro plant is grown as an ornamental, it is often called Elephant Ears due to the shape of its large leaves.

Nowadays the word “luau” denotes almost any kind of party on the Hawaiian Islands, but to the purist a luau is a feast that always includes a serving of “poi”, the bulbous underground stems of taro baked with coconut milk.

60. Swiss river AAR
The Aar (also called the “Aare” in German) is the longest river entirely in Switzerland. A famous spot along the Aar is the Reichenbach Falls in the center of the country, actually a series of waterfalls near the city of Meiringen. These falls are renowned in the world of literature as it was here that Sherlock Holmes fell to his supposed doom with his nemesis Professor Moriarty (in “The Adventure of the Final Problem”).

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Mama who sang with the Papas CASS
5. Mercury and Saturn ORBS
9. “What a tragedy” SO SAD
14. Mercury or Saturn AUTO
15. Picnic spot PARK
16. Revise, as text EMEND
17. Mine car TRAM
18. Pincushion alternative ETUI
19. Maternally related ENATE
20. Bad web designer’s product? NOT A PRETTY SITE (sight)
23. Extreme anger IRE
24. Boy LAD
25. Hanoi holiday TET
26. Sandwich shop letters BLT
28. Cut companion PASTE
30. Heavy herbivore RHINO
32. Greek goddess of the dawn EOS
33. Coll. dorm mentors RAS
35. Essen-to-Leipzig direction OST
36. Food for Fido ALPO
37. Start the service ceremonially? LEAD WITH A RITE (right)
41. “Roger that” COPY
42. Keats wrote one to a nightingale ODE
43. Funnyman Caesar SID
44. Prefix with duct OVI-
45. Melbourne marsupial KOALA
47. Discourage DETER
51. Get hitched WED
52. Shimon Peres’s land: Abbr. ISR
53. Cosmo, e.g. MAG
55. Delighted utterance AAH!
56. Dieter’s hope when entering the brewpub? LET THERE BE LITE (light)
60. Shoot for AIM AT
61. Like some support SOLE
62. Crack pilots ACES
63. Flambé AFIRE
64. Laos location ASIA
65. Unlike a dead end, briefly THRU
66. Spy mission, in brief RECON
67. Cornerstone datum YEAR
68. Boo relative HISS

Down
1. It makes a feline frisky CATNIP
2. Roman goddess of the dawn AURORA
3. Declares STATES
4. Dream-inducing “Brave New World” drug SOMA
5. Puccini work OPERA
6. Like slasher films, typically RATED R
7. Champagne designation BRUT
8. Very jumpy SKITTISH
9. Deals with SEES TO
10. Present opening? OMNI-
11. “Click It or Ticket” device SEAT BELT
12. Range playmate of song ANTELOPE
13. JFK’s predecessor DDE
21. Profess one’s innocence, perhaps PLEAD
22. Grapevine starters? YENTAS
27. Chinese menu surname TSO
29. Cafeteria convenience TRAY
31. Monopoly miniature HOTEL
34. “Just Do It” logo SWOOSH
36. Guy or gal Friday AIDE
37. Topic for advice columnists LOVE LIFE
38. Serious flu outbreak, e.g. EPIDEMIC
39. Start of a speculation I DARE SAY …
40. Blue __ Mountains RIDGE
41. Chick-fil-A spokescritter COW
45. “Awww”-inducing pet shop resident KITTEN
46. Earhart in the air AMELIA
48. Chinese martial art TAI CHI
49. Diner patrons EATERS
50. Monkey used in research RHESUS
54. “Fuzzy Wuzzy was __” A BEAR
57. Luau staple TARO
58. Fragrant flower ROSE
59. Strip of latticework LATH
60. Swiss river AAR

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