LA Times Crossword Answers 24 Sep 13, Tuesday

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across
6. Pillow covers SHAMS
A sham is something that is imitation, fake. In the world of bed linens a sham is also imitation and fake, in the sense that it is a decorative cover designed to cover up a regular pillow used for sleeping.

11. Healthful facility SPA
The word “spa” migrated into English from Belgium, as Spa is the name of a municipality in the east of the country that is famous for its healing hot springs. The name “Spa” comes from the Walloon word “espa” meaning “spring, fountain”.

14. Nocturnal primate with a ringed tail LEMUR
Lemurs are the most unusual-looking creatures, native to the island of Madagascar off the east coast of Africa. With their white fur and dark eyes that are very reflective at night, they have a “ghostly” appearance. Indeed, the animals takes their name from Roman mythology in which “lemures” were spirits of the restless dead.

15. Squiggle in “piñata” TILDE
Piñatas originated in Mexico, probably among the Aztecs or Mayans. Today piñatas are usually made from cardboard that is brightly decorated with papier-mâché. Traditionally a piñata was made out of a clay pot, adorned with feathers and ribbons and filled with small treasures. During religious ceremonies the clay pots would be suspended and broken open so that the contents would spill out onto the ground at the feet of a god as an offering.

17. *1972 hit with the line “The day the music died” AMERICAN PIE (giving “American cheese”)
Don McLean released his greatest hit, “American Pie”, back in 1971. Despite the song’s iconic position in the pop repertoire, McLean has been remarkably reticent about its origins and the meaning of the lyrics. We do know that it was inspired by the death of Buddy Holly in a plane crash (“the day the music died”). McLean has also told us that he first read about the death of his idol when delivering newspapers the day after the crash (“February made me shiver/with every paper I’d deliver”). Although the lyrics have been analyzed and interpreted by many, McLean’s stance remains that it is just a poem set to music …

American cheese is a processed cheese, and cannot actually be labelled as “cheese” but has to be called “processed cheese” or “cheese product”. The same product used to be called “Canadian cheese” in Canada, but usually goes by the name “singles” now as slices tend to be individually wrapped.

24. Pennsylvanie, par exemple ETAT
In French, one state (état) in the US is Pennsylvania (Pennsylvanie).

26. *County fair prize BLUE RIBBON (giving “blue cheese”)
The mold on blue cheese is actually from the genus Penicillium, the same genus of mold that is the source of many antibiotics.

32. Sambuca flavoring ANISE
Sambuca is an Italian liqueur that is flavored with anise. Sambuca is often served straight up with three coffee beans floating on the surface. The beans are said to represent health, happiness and prosperity. A more “saucy” representation for the beans is the husband, wife and mistress.

35. Place for a polar bear FLOE
An ice floe is a sheet of ice that has separated from an ice field and is floating freely on the ocean.

40. *Home-based business COTTAGE INDUSTRY (giving “cottage cheese”)
Cottage cheese got its name because it was a simple cheese that was made by simple folk living in cottages, using any milk left over from butter production.

43. __ II razor TRAC
Gillette introduced the Trac II in 1971, the world’s first twin-blade razor.

46. Blue gem, for short LAPIS
Lapis lazuli is a blue, semi-precious stone mined mainly in Afghanistan. Lapis lazuli is Latin for “stone of Lazhward”, referring to the Persian name for the location where the stone was mined. Our word “azure”, a shade of blue, has the same root.

49. *Beef-braised-with-tomatoes dish SWISS STEAK (giving “Swiss cheese”)
The dish known as Swiss steak has nothing to do with the country of Switzerland. Swiss steak is usually made with beef that has been rolled out or pounded and then braised in a pot of stewed tomatoes. The term “swissing” means to pound or roll out a material. Swissing makes tougher cuts of meat more tender.

Swiss cheese is a relatively generic term and a type of cheese produced in various countries and not necessarily in Switzerland. What the cheeses all have in common is a resemblance to the original Swiss Emmental.

53. Jones with a locker DAVY
No one is really sure why “Davy Jones’s Locker” is used to refer to the bottom of the sea, but the first known reference to the idiom was made in “The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle” published in 1751, written by Scottish author Tobias Smollett. It is clear however, that Davy Jones is a euphemism for the devil or god of the seas.

57. Cagney’s TV partner LACEY
On the eighties police drama “Cagney & Lacey” Christine Cagney was played by Sharon Gless. A few years after “Cagney & Lacey” ended its run, Gless married the show’s executive producer, Barney Rosenzweig.

Tyne Daly really came into the public eye playing Detective Lacey in the TV police drama “Cagney and Lacey”. More recently Daly played the mother of the title character in “Judging Amy”.

58. Spring bloomer IRIS
Iris is a genus of flowering plants that come in a wide variety of flower colors. The term “iris” is a Greek word meaning “rainbow”.

61. Prefix for the birds AVI-
The prefix “avi-” means “bird-related” as in “aviculture”, the breeding of birds.

62. Green Bay Packer fans … and a hint to the answers to starred clues CHEESEHEADS
When Curly Lambeau founded his small-town football team in Green Bay in 1919, he was working for the Indian Packing Company. Lambeau went to his employers looking for sponsorship and was given $250 provided that the team was named for the company. And so, the team was originally referred to as the Green Bay Indians, but by the time they took to the field for their first game it had changed to the Packers and Lambeau was $250 richer.

66. Pince-__ glasses NEZ
Pince-nez are eyeglasses clipped to the bridge of the nose. “Pince-nez” is French, translating as “pinch the nose”.

67. Prefix meaning “sun” HELIO-
Helios was the god of the Sun in Greek mythology. Helios was the brother of Selene, the goddess of the moon, and Eos, the goddess of the dawn. Helios drove his chariot of the sun across the sky during the day, returning to the East at night be travelling through the ocean.

68. Krupp Works city ESSEN
The Krupp manufacturing interest originated with Friedrich Krupp who inherited an iron forge that the family owned in the German city of Essen. Friedrich made some not-so-clever investments designed to get the family into the cast steel business. Friedrich died quite young, and his son, Alfred, had to take over the struggling steelworks at only 14 years of age. When he took the helm, the company had five workers. At the time of his death there were about 20,000 employees, and Krupp’s was the world’s largest industrial company.

69. Afternoon ora TRE
In Italian, an afternoon hour (ora) is three (tre).

70. Bagel flavoring ONION
The bagel was invented in the Polish city of Kraków in the 16th century. Bagels were brought to this country by Jewish immigrants from Poland who mainly established homes in and around New York City.

71. “Star Wars” surname? DETOO
Artoo’s proper name is R2-D2. R2-D2 is the smaller of the two famous droids from the “Star Wars” movies. British actor Kenny Baker, who stands just 3 ft 8 ins tall, has been the man inside the R2-D2 droid for all six of the “Star Wars” movies.

Down
3. Alpha’s opposite OMEGA
Omega is the last letter of the Greek alphabet and is the one that looks like a horseshoe. The word “omega” literally means “great O” (O-mega). Compare this with the Greek letter Omicron meaning “little O” (O-micron).

4. “__ Man in Havana”: Graham Greene novel OUR
“Our Man in Havana” is a marvelously entertaining novel by Graham Greene, first published in 1958. It’s all about a British vacuum cleaner salesman who lives in Havana, Cuba. The salesman is recruited by the British secret service, and then sends fake information to London, just to get paid. The novel was adapted into a fabulous film of the same name in 1959, starring Alec Guinness.

Graham Greene was a writer and playwright from England. Greene wrote some of my favorite novels, including “Brighton Rock”, “The End of the Affair”, “The Confidential Agent”, “The Third Man”, “The Quiet American” and “Our Man in Havana”. Greene’s books often feature espionage in exotic locales. Greene himself worked for MI6, the UK’s foreign intelligence agency. In fact, Greene’s MI6 supervisor was Kim Philby, the famed Soviet spy who penetrated high into British intelligence.

5. Barbra’s “A Star Is Born” co-star KRIS
The singer Kris Kristofferson was born in Brownsville, Texas and was the son of a USAF Major General. Indeed, Kristofferson’s paternal grandfather was also a military officer, but in the Swedish Army. Kristofferson himself went into the US Army and served in West Germany, achieving the rank of Captain.

“A Star Is Born” is a 1937 film starring Janet Gaynor as an upcoming Hollywood actress. “A Star Is Born” was remade twice, in 1954 with Judy Garland playing the lead, and in 1976 with Barbra Streisand.

7. Many an Indian, religiously HINDU
Hinduism is the world’s third largest religion, after Christianity and Islam.

8. The Eiger, e.g. ALP
The Eiger is a mountain in the Bernese Alps in Switzerland. The Eiger is a noted peak for mountain climbing, with its treacherous north face being the most famous approach to the summit. Over sixty climbers have died since 1935 on that north face.

11. Vehicle safety devices SEAT BELTS
There is only one state in the US that does not require drivers to wear seat belts by law, and that is New Hampshire.

13. Former senator Specter ARLEN
Arlen Specter was the US Senator for Pennsylvania, famous for switching from the Republican to the Democratic Party in 2009. In 2010 he lost the Democratic primary and his seat went to Pat Toomey, a Republican. Spector developed a reputation for himself of being hard to work with over the years, earning the nickname “Snarlin’ Arlen”.

18. __ salad COBB
Ty Cobb’s first cousin, Robert H. Cobb, owned the Brown Derby chain of restaurants. One of his regular customers was the famous Sid Grauman, who ran Grauman’s Chinese Theater. Late one night, Grauman asked for a snack, and Cobb came up with a chopped salad simply made from ingredients he happened to have in the refrigerator. Grauman liked it so much that continued to request it, and the Cobb salad was born.

27. Boarding school jackets ETONS
An Eton jacket is usually black, cut square at the hips and with wide lapels. It is named for the design of jacket that is worn by the younger students at Eton College just outside London.

28. Bassoon vibrator REED
Our modern bassoon first appeared in the 1800s and has had a place in the concert orchestra ever since.

30. “But I don’t wanna __ pirate!”: “Seinfeld” BE A
“But I don’t wanna be a pirate!” is a famous line from a “Seinfeld” episode called “The Puffy Shirt”. In the episode, Jerry inadvertently agrees to wear a puffy shirt on “The Today Show”, as the shirt was designed by Kramer’s new girlfriend. The puffy shirt makes Jerry look like a pirate.

34. Highlight in print, in a way ITALICIZE
Italic type leans to the right. The style is known as “italic” because the stylized calligraphic form of writing originated in Italy, probably in the Vatican.

35. Banquet FEAST
A banquet is an elaborate feast. “Banquet” is a term that seems to have reversed in meaning over time. Coming into English via French from Old Italian, “banquet” is derived from “banco” meaning “bench”. The original “banco” meal was simply a snack eaten on a bench, rather than at a table.

38. G.I. grub MRE
The Meal, Ready-to-Eat (MRE) comes in a lightweight package that’s easy to tote around. The MRE replaced the more cumbersome Meal, Combat, Individual (MCI) in 1981, a meal-in-a-can. In turn, the MCI had replaced the C-ration in 1958, a less sophisticated meal-in-a-can with a more limited choice.

39. Part of TBS: Abbr. SYS
Turner Broadcasting System (TBS)

41. Pinot __ GRIS
Pinot gris is a wine grape used to make white wine called Pinot gris, which is also known as Pinot grigio. DNA analysis has shown that the Pinot gris grape mutated from the Pinot noir variety.

42. Detroit labor org. UAW
United Auto Workers (UAW)

47. Film with a classic shower scene PSYCHO
Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 movie “Psycho” was based on a 1959 novel of the same name by Robert Bloch. In turn, the novel was loosely based on real-life events that took place in Wisconsin. The famous shower scene runs for a full 3 minutes, and is one of the most iconic scenes in cinematic history. The blood shown in the shower is actually chocolate syrup, and the sounds of the knife going into flesh are the sounds of a knife being plunged into a melon.

48. Sooner State migrant OKIE
The 1889 Indian Appropriations Act officially opened up the so called Unassigned Lands, land in Oklahoma on which no Native American tribes had settled. Once the Act was signed, those lands became available for settlement. Those people that settled the same lands illegally, prior the date specified, they were termed “Sooners” as their situation was defined in the “sooner clause” of the Act. “Sooner State” is now the nickname for Oklahoma.

51. Five-letter song refrain EIEIO
There was an American version of the English children’s song “Old MacDonald Had a Farm” (E-I-E-I-O), that was around in the days of WWI. The first line of the US version goes “Old MacDougal had a farm, in Ohio-i-o”.

54. Salt’s “Halt!” AVAST!
“Avast” is a nautical term used to tell someone to stop or desist from what they are doing. The word comes from the Dutch “hou vast” meaning “hold fast”.

64. Yale alum ELI
Elihu Yale was a wealthy merchant born in Boston in 1649. Yale worked for the British East India Company, and for many years served as governor of a settlement at Madras (now Chennai) in India. After India, Yale took over his father’s estate near Wrexham in Wales. It was while resident in Wrexham that Yale responded to a request for financial support for the Collegiate School of Connecticut in 1701. He sent the school a donation, which was used to erect a new building in New Haven that was named “Yale” in his honor. In 1718, the whole school was renamed to “Yale College”. To this day, students of Yale are nicknamed “Elis”, again honoring Elihu.

65. Suffix with Brooklyn -ESE
The New York dialect of English is sometimes called Brooklynese, I believe. Youse guys …

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For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Babbling waterway BROOK
6. Pillow covers SHAMS
11. Healthful facility SPA
14. Nocturnal primate with a ringed tail LEMUR
15. Squiggle in “piñata” TILDE
16. Make a mistake ERR
17. *1972 hit with the line “The day the music died” AMERICAN PIE (giving “American cheese”)
19. Feel sick AIL
20. Sharp turn ZIG
21. Auction cry SOLD!
22. “I’m innocent!” NOT ME!
24. Pennsylvanie, par exemple ETAT
26. *County fair prize BLUE RIBBON (giving “blue cheese”)
29. Receding tide EBB
31. On edge TENSE
32. Sambuca flavoring ANISE
35. Place for a polar bear FLOE
37. Street shaders ELMS
40. *Home-based business COTTAGE INDUSTRY (giving “cottage cheese”)
43. __ II razor TRAC
44. Tells in a bad way RATS
45. Biblical beasts ASSES
46. Blue gem, for short LAPIS
48. “I __ you one” OWE
49. *Beef-braised-with-tomatoes dish SWISS STEAK (giving “Swiss cheese”)
53. Jones with a locker DAVY
57. Cagney’s TV partner LACEY
58. Spring bloomer IRIS
60. Go head-to-head VIE
61. Prefix for the birds AVI-
62. Green Bay Packer fans … and a hint to the answers to starred clues CHEESEHEADS
66. Pince-__ glasses NEZ
67. Prefix meaning “sun” HELIO-
68. Krupp Works city ESSEN
69. Afternoon ora TRE
70. Bagel flavoring ONION
71. “Star Wars” surname? DETOO

Down
1. Burn brightly BLAZE
2. Send a money order, say REMIT
3. Alpha’s opposite OMEGA
4. “__ Man in Havana”: Graham Greene novel OUR
5. Barbra’s “A Star Is Born” co-star KRIS
6. Delay on purpose STALL
7. Many an Indian, religiously HINDU
8. The Eiger, e.g. ALP
9. Start of the 16th century MDI
10. Greeted and seated SEEN IN
11. Vehicle safety devices SEAT BELTS
12. First-class PRIMO
13. Former senator Specter ARLEN
18. __ salad COBB
23. Excessively preoccupied OBSESSED
25. Precedent setter TEST CASE
27. Boarding school jackets ETONS
28. Bassoon vibrator REED
30. “But I don’t wanna __ pirate!”: “Seinfeld” BE A
32. Do some film work ACT
33. Partner of neither NOR
34. Highlight in print, in a way ITALICIZE
35. Banquet FEAST
36. Put a match to LIT
38. G.I. grub MRE
39. Part of TBS: Abbr. SYS
41. Pinot __ GRIS
42. Detroit labor org. UAW
47. Film with a classic shower scene PSYCHO
48. Sooner State migrant OKIE
49. Bias SLANT
50. Have second thoughts WAVER
51. Five-letter song refrain EIEIO
52. Felonious fire ARSON
54. Salt’s “Halt!” AVAST!
55. Audio counterpart VIDEO
56. Like “Will you marry me?” questionwise YES/NO
59. Storage building SHED
63. Clucker HEN
64. Yale alum ELI
65. Suffix with Brooklyn -ESE

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