LA Times Crossword Answers 14 Mar 14, Friday

CROSSWORD SETTER: Marti DuGuay-Carpenter
THEME: CS Swap … today’s themed answers are well known phrases with a CH- sequence swapped for SH-:

17A. Liner with Intel inside? SILICON SHIP (from “silicon chip”)
22A. Nylon notable? SHEER LEADER (from “cheerleader”)
37A. Get one’s kicks in a painful way? TAKE IT ON THE SHIN (from “take it on the chin”)
47A. Principal plant? THE BIG SHILL (from “The Big Chill”)
60A. Surprise the neighborhood? SHOCK A BLOCK (from “chock-a-block”)

BILL BUTLER’S COMPLETION TIME: 18m 06s
ANSWERS I MISSED: 0

Today’s Wiki-est, Amazonian Googlies
Across

5. Ally of Sun CHIANG
Chiang Kai-Shek was the leader of the Nationalist Movement in China right through to the end of WWII. The Nationalists lost out in a Civil War to the Communists backed by the Soviet Union after war, and Chiang Kai-Shek and his government were forced to flee to Taiwan. Chiang Kai-shek claimed rule over China from Taiwan until his death in 1975.

Sun Yat-sen is known as the “Father of the Nation” in China, and is uniquely revered in both the mainland of China and on the island of Taiwan. During his rule as president of the country he promoted his political philosophy known at the Three Principles of the People, namely nationalism, democracy and the people’s livelihood.

14. Unrestrainedly AMOK
The phrase “to run amok” (sometimes “to run amuck”) has been around since the 1670s and is derived from the Malay word for “attacking furiously”, “amuk”. The word “amok” was also used as a noun to describe Malay natives who were “frenzied”. Given Malaya’s troubled history, the natives probably had good reason for that frenzy …

17. Liner with Intel inside? SILICON SHIP (from “silicon chip”)
Silicon is a semiconducting material. This means it is sort of halfway between an insulator and a conductor. Silicon acts as an insulator until a voltage is applied, an if that voltage is sufficiently high then the silicon becomes a conductor. The electronics industry uses this phenomenon to make devices that can “switch” (turn from insulator to conductor) by application of a voltage.

25. Bag VALISE
“Valise” is a French word for “suitcase”.

29. High mountain ALP
Mont Blanc is the highest mountain in the Alps. The name “Mont Blanc” translates from French into “white mountain”. The mountain lies on the border between France and Italy, and it has been generally accepted for decades that the summit lies within French territory. However, there have been official claims that the summit does in fact fall within the borders of Italy.

34. “Gerontion” poet’s monogram TSE
The author T. S. Eliot was the son of Henry Ware Eliot and Charlotte Champe Stearns, so his full name was Thomas Stearns Eliot (TSE).

“Gerontion” is a poem by T. S. Eliot, first published in 1920. The work portrays the opinions of a “gerontic”, an elderly man.

44. Music-licensing org. BMI
ASCAP (the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers) collects licence fees for musicians and distributes royalties to composers whose works have been performed. BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated) provides the same service.

47. Principal plant? THE BIG SHILL (from “The Big Chill”)
A shill is someone planted, perhaps in an audience, with the job of feigning enthusiasm.

“The Big Chill” is a 1983 baby-boomer comedy-drama that is noted as much for its “oldies” soundtrack as for the acting, both of which are excellent. The film follows a group of college friends who get together at the funeral of a friend who committed suicide. The great cast includes Glenn Close, Jeff Goldblum, William Hurt and Kevin Kline. Kevin Costner actually played Alex, the man who died, but scenes showing his face were cut from the final version of the movie.

59. Pay stub? -OLA
Payola is the illegal practice of paying radio stations or disk jockeys to repeatedly play a particular piece of music. The impetus behind the crime is that the more often a song is played, the more likely it is to sell. The term “payola” comes from the words “pay” and “Victrola”, an RCA brand name for an early phonograph.

63. University of Minnesota mascot Goldy __ GOPHER
Goldy Gopher is the mascot of the sports teams of the University of Minnesota. The teams themselves are known as the Golden Gophers. The mascot comes from Minnesota’s nickname, “The Gopher State”, a nickname that dates back to 1857.

66. Professorial duds TWEEDS
Tweed is a rough woolen fabric very much associated with Scotland in the UK, and County Donegal in Ireland. The cloth was originally called “tweel”, the Scots word for “twill”. Apparently a London merchant misinterpreted some handwriting in the early 1800s and assumed the fabric was called “tweed”, a reference to the Scottish River Tweed, and the name stuck …

“Duds” is an informal word for clothing, coming from the word “dudde” that was used around 1300 as the name for a cloak.

Down
6. ’20s-’30s skating gold medalist HENIE
Sonja Henie was a World and Olympic Champion figure skater from Norway from the days when “amateur” sports stars were not paid. Henie made up for her lack of income from competing by developing a career in Hollywood. She was one of highest paid stars at the height of her movie career.

8. “My Name Is __ Lev”: Chaim Potok novel ASHER
“My Name Is Asher Lev” is a novel by Rabbi Chaim Potok, first published in 1972. The story follows the experiences of Asher Lev, a Hasidic Jewish boy in New York City. His story continues in the sequel “The Gift of Asher Lev”.

10. 57-Down measure GNP
(57. Coll. major ECON)
A country’s Gross National Product (GNP) is the value of all services and products produced by its residents in a particular year. GNP includes all production wherever it is in the world, as long as the business is owned by residents of the country concerned. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) is different, and is the value of all services and goods produced within the borders of the country for that year.

11. Bona fide VALID
“Bona fide(s)” translates from the Latin as “in good faith”, and is used to indicate honest intentions. It can also mean that something is authentic, like a piece of art that is represented in good faith as being genuine.

12. Dress style A-LINE
An A-line skirt is one that fits snugly at the hips and flares toward the hem.

13. Floor NADIR
The nadir is the direction pointing immediately below a particular location (through to the other side of the Earth for example). The opposite direction, that pointing immediately above, is called the zenith. We also use the term “nadir” to mean “lowest point”, and “zenith” to mean “highest point”.

18. Pool lead-in CESS-
A cesspit (also “cesspool”) is a covered tank or pit used for the disposal of human waste.

25. Highest power? VETO
“Veto” comes directly from Latin and means “I forbid”. The word was used by tribunes of Ancient Rome to indicate that they opposed measures passed by the Senate.

26. Petri dish filler AGAR
Agar is a jelly extracted from seaweed that has many uses. Agar is found in Japanese desserts, and can also be used as a food thickener or even as a laxative. In the world of science it is the most common medium used for growing bacteria in Petri dishes.

Julius Richard Petri was a German bacteriologist and was the man after whom the Petri dish is named. The petri dish can have an agar gel on the bottom which acts a nutrient source for the specimen being grown and studied, in which case the dish plus agar is referred to as an “agar plate”.

28. Chemical suffix –IDE
In chemistry, when a metal combines with a non-metal, the non-metal is often given the suffix -ide. One example would be iron oxide (common rust).

32. Genetic messenger RNA
Ribonucleic Acid (RNA) is an essential catalyst in the manufacture of proteins in the body. The genetic code in DNA determines the sequence of amino acids that make up each protein. That sequence is read in DNA by messenger RNA, and amino acids are delivered for protein manufacture in the correct sequence by what is called transfer RNA. The amino acids are then formed into proteins by ribosomal RNA.

33. Unexpected fictional visitors ETS
Extraterrestrial (ET)

34. You, to a Friend THEE
Members of the Religious Society of Friends are known as Friends or Quakers. The Christian sect started in England in the 1640s, led by George Fox. The principal tenet at that point was that Christians could have direct experience of Jesus Christ without the mediation of clergy, a reflection of the increasing dissatisfaction with the established church at that time. The term “Quaker” is thought to have been used earlier in reference to foreign religious sects whose followers were given to fits of shaking during religious fervor. Somehow that term became used for members of the Religious Society of Friends.

35. Function in 39-Down SINE
The most familiar trigonometric functions are sine, cosine and tangent. Each of these is a ratio, a ratio of two sides of a right-angled triangle. The “reciprocal” of these three functions are secant, cosecant and cotangent. The reciprocal functions are simply the inverted ratios, the inverted sine, cosine and tangent. These inverted ratios should not be confused with the “inverse” trigonometric functions e.g. arcsine, arccosine and arctangent. These inverse functions are the reverse of the sine, cosine and tangent. For example, the arctangent can be read as “What angle is equivalent to the following ration of opposite over adjacent?”

38. “__ Said”: Neil Diamond hit I AM… I
“I Am… I Said” is a song written and performed by Neil Diamond, first released in 1971. “I Am… I Said” earned Diamond his first ever Grammy nomination.

I saw Neil Diamond in concert about 15 years ago, and I must say he does put on a great show. His voice is cracking a bit, but that didn’t seem to spoil anyone’s enjoyment. I’ve also seen Diamond interviewed a few times on television, and I wouldn’t say he has the most scintillating of personalities.

39. It involves angles, for short TRIG
Trigonometry is a branch of mathematics dealing with triangles, and calculations based on the relationships between a triangle’s angles and the lengths of its sides.

40. 35mm camera option SLR
SLR stands for “single lens reflex”. Usually cameras with changeable lenses are the SLR type. The main feature of an SLR is that a mirror reflects the image seen through the lens out through the viewfinder, so that the photographer sees exactly what the lens sees. The mirror moves out of the way as the picture is taken, and the image that comes through the lens falls onto unexposed film, or nowadays onto a digital sensor.

44. Marathon unit: Abbr. BBL
The volume of one oil barrel is equivalent to 42 US gallons. A barrel is correctly abbreviated to “bbl”. Barrels aren’t really used for transporting crude oil anymore. Instead, oil moves in bulk through pipelines and in tankers. “Barrel” is just a quantity these days.

Marathon Oil is an American oil and gas company headquartered in Houston, Texas. Marathon was founded in 1887 as the Ohio Oil Company.

47. Chophouse choice T-BONE
The T-bone and porterhouse are related cuts of meat, with the latter being a larger version of the former.

48. Tin Man actor Jack HALEY
Actor Jack Haley played the Tin Man in “The Wizard of Oz”. Haley was the second choice for the role, as it was originally given to Buddy Ebsen (who later played Jed Clampett in “The Beverly Hillbillies”). Ebsen was being “painted up” as the Tin Man when he had an extreme, near-fatal reaction from inhaling the aluminum dust makeup that was being used. When Haley took over, the makeup was changed to a paste, but it was still uncomfortable and caused him to miss the first four days of shooting due to a reaction in his eyes. During filming, Haley must have made good friends with the movie’s star, Judy Garland, as years later Jack’s son married Judy’s daughter, Liza Minnelli.

51. “Wag the Dog” actress HECHE
My favorite movie starring the actress Anne Heche is “Six Days Seven Nights”, a romantic comedy in which she plays opposite Harrison Ford. Heche is noted for her difficult private life. She wrote that her father had molested her as a child and gave her a sexually transmitted disease (he later revealed that he was homosexual, and died of AIDS). Heche dated comedian Steve Martin for two years, and then lived with comedian Ellen DeGeneres for three. Soon after breaking up with DeGeneres, she started exhibiting eccentric behavior for a while, claiming that she was the daughter of God, and that she would take everyone back to heaven in her spaceship. Happily, I think things have calmed down for her in recent years.

The 1997 movie “Wag the Dog” is a black comedy starring Dustin Hoffman and Robert De Niro. It tells the story of a fake war that is manufactured by a Washington spin doctor in order to distract the American electorate. It is based on the novel “American Hero” by Larry Beinhart. In the movie the war is fictitious and the president goes unnamed. In the novel, Beinhart uses Desert Storm as the war in his storyline, and George H. W. Bush as the President.

55. Hoax FLAM
“Flim-flam” is another word for a confidence trick. The term has been in use since the 1500s, would you believe?

56. New York college with a mascot named Killian IONA
Iona College is a Roman Catholic school run by Christian Brothers in New Rochelle, New York. The school’s sports teams are called the Iona Gaels, and the team mascot goes by the name Killian.

58. Fashion letters DKNY
Donna Karan is an American fashion designer, creator of the Donna Karan New York (DKNY) clothing label. Karan was very much raised in the fashion industry, as her mother was a model and her stepfather a tailor.

60. York, for one: Abbr. SGT
The marvelous 1941 film called “Sergeant York” stars Gary Cooper playing the real-life WWI hero Alvin York. York was the most decorated American soldier in the First World War, and his story helped make the movie about his life the highest grossing film of 1941. For his heroism, York was not only awarded the Medal of Honor by the United States, but also the French Légion d’honneur (the highest decoration in France) and the Italian Croce di Guerra.

Return to top of page

For the sake of completion, here is a full listing of all the answers:
Across
1. Set count REPS
5. Ally of Sun CHIANG
11. Relocation aid VAN
14. Unrestrainedly AMOK
15. Divulges LETS ON
16. As per A LA
17. Liner with Intel inside? SILICON SHIP (from “silicon chip”)
19. One may be flipped LID
20. When many night visions occur? PRIMETIME
21. Revealing garb MINI
22. Nylon notable? SHEER LEADER (from “cheerleader”)
25. Bag VALISE
29. High mountain ALP
30. “Yikes!” EGAD!
31. Lock TRESS
34. “Gerontion” poet’s monogram TSE
37. Get one’s kicks in a painful way? TAKE IT ON THE SHIN (from “take it on the chin”)
41. Rush participant’s prize ORE
42. Fields AREAS
43. Give for a while LEND
44. Music-licensing org. BMI
45. Meshes AGREES
47. Principal plant? THE BIG SHILL (from “The Big Chill”)
53. Playground bouncer BALL
54. Like some important letters CERTIFIED
59. Pay stub? -OLA
60. Surprise the neighborhood? SHOCK A BLOCK (from “chock-a-block”)
62. Take home NET
63. University of Minnesota mascot Goldy __ GOPHER
64. Unsigned, briefly ANON
65. Private __ EYE
66. Professorial duds TWEEDS
67. Numerous MANY

Down
1. Scrape RASP
2. Mideast VIP EMIR
3. __ sci POLI
4. Take from the top SKIM
5. Dress CLOTHE
6. ’20s-’30s skating gold medalist HENIE
7. Personal answer IT’S ME
8. “My Name Is __ Lev”: Chaim Potok novel ASHER
9. “__ can’t” NO I
10. 57-Down measure GNP
11. Bona fide VALID
12. Dress style A-LINE
13. Floor NADIR
18. Pool lead-in CESS-
21. Tourist’s guide MAP
23. Secure at the dock LASH
24. Otherwise ELSE
25. Highest power? VETO
26. Petri dish filler AGAR
27. Vacation destination LAKE
28. Chemical suffix -IDE
31. Digital temperature gauge? TOE
32. Genetic messenger RNA
33. Unexpected fictional visitors ETS
34. You, to a Friend THEE
35. Function in 39-Down SINE
36. Scraps ENDS
38. “__ Said”: Neil Diamond hit I AM… I
39. It involves angles, for short TRIG
40. 35mm camera option SLR
44. Marathon unit: Abbr. BBL
45. Trains may stop at them ALTARS
46. Smooth-talking GLIB
47. Chophouse choice T-BONE
48. Tin Man actor Jack HALEY
49. Make merry ELATE
50. Breadth SCOPE
51. “Wag the Dog” actress HECHE
52. Ticked IRKED
55. Hoax FLAM
56. New York college with a mascot named Killian IONA
57. Coll. major ECON
58. Fashion letters DKNY
60. York, for one: Abbr. SGT
61. Do-it-yourselfer’s concern HOW

Return to top of page