LA Times Crossword 11 May 20, Monday

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Constructed by: Robert E. Lee Morris
Edited by: Rich Norris

Today’s Reveal Answer: Jump-Start

Themed answers each start with a type of JUMP seen at an athletic meet:

  • 61A Battery boost … and what the first part of the answers to starred clues can literally be : JUMP-START
  • 17A *Internet connection touted in the ’90s as faster than dial-up : BROADBAND (giving “broad jump”)
  • 38A *Extended engagement : LONG RUN (giving “long jump”)
  • 11D *Diamond defensive rarity : TRIPLE PLAY (giving “triple jump”)
  • 29D *Vegas spender : HIGH ROLLER (giving “high jump”)

Bill’s time: 5m 10s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

5 Comedian Foxworthy : JEFF

Jeff Foxworthy is a standup comedian and TV personality. He belongs to a comedy troupe called the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, the other members being Larry the Cable Guy. Bill Engvall and Ron White. Foxworthy also served as the host on the quiz show “Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader”.

14 Gershwin’s “__ Rhythm” : I GOT

“I Got Rhythm” is a song composed by George and Ira Gershwin in 1930 for the musical “Girl Crazy”. The song was performed by Ethel Merman in the original production on Broadway. “I Got Rhythm” makes another appearance in a George Gershwin work, in the 1951 musical film “An American in Paris”. Gene Kelly sang the song in the movie, while tap-dancing.

15 Diva’s delivery : ARIA

The term “diva” comes to us from Latin via Italian. “Diva” is the feminine form of “divus” meaning “divine one”. The word is used in Italy to mean “goddess” or “fine lady”, and especially is applied to the prima donna in an opera. We often use the term to describe a singer with a big ego.

16 Skylit courts : ATRIA

In modern architecture, an atrium (plural “atria” or “atriums”) is a large open space usually in the center of a building and extending upwards to the roof. The original atrium was an open court in the center of an Ancient Roman house. One could access most of the enclosed rooms of the house from the atrium.

17 *Internet connection touted in the ’90s as faster than dial-up : BROADBAND (giving “broad jump”)

In Internet terms, the word “broadband” is used to describe Internet access that is faster than dialup. In more broader (pun!) telecommunication terms, “broadband” is used to describe “bandwidth” data transmission that is “broad” enough to carry several signals and several different types of traffic at the same time.

Women were first referred to as “broads” in the early 1900s. The slang term was deemed so offensive by the 1960s that the “broad jump” athletic event was renamed to the “long jump”.

20 Bill for beers : BAR TAB

When we run a “tab” at a bar, we are running a “tabulation”, a listing of what we owe. Such a use of “tab” is American slang that originated in the 1880s.

21 Barbie’s beau : KEN

Barbie’s male counterpart doll is Ken, and Ken’s family name is Carson. Barbie’s full name is Barbie Millicent Roberts. When Ken was introduced in 1959, it was as Barbie’s boyfriend. In 2004 it was announced that Ken and Barbie were splitting up, and needed to spend quality time apart. Soon after the split, Barbie “met” Blaine, a boogie boarder from Australia. Happily, Barbie and Ken reconciled and reunited on Valentine’s Day 2011.

23 Church recess : APSE

The apse of a church or cathedral is a semicircular recess in an outer wall, usually with a half-dome as a roof and often where there resides an altar. Originally, apses were used as burial places for the clergy and also for storage of important relics.

24 4 x 4, for short : UTE

A utility vehicle is often called a “ute” for short. Nowadays one mainly hears about sport-utes and crossover-utes.

25 Brontë and Post : EMILYS

In terms of age, Emily Brontë was the middle of the three Brontë sisters, younger than Charlotte and older than Anne. Emily was a poet and a novelist, and is best remembered for her only novel, “Wuthering Heights”. Emily died very young, at 30 years old. She never recovered from a severe cold that she caught at the funeral service of Branwell Brontë, her only brother. The cold developed into tuberculosis, for which she eschewed medical attention. She passed away after three months of illness.

Emily Post was a writer from Baltimore, Maryland who is best known for her writings on the subject of etiquette. Her work giving advice on etiquette is continued by the Emily Post Institute, which she founded in 1946.

27 1987 Beatty/Hoffman bomb : ISHTAR

“Ishtar” is a 1987 film that really bombed at the box office. It stars Warren Beatty and Dustin Hoffman, as lounge singers working in Morocco! There’s a Cold War plot and, thank goodness, it’s a comedy. Apparently, the film is so bad that it never even made it to DVD.

30 Flammable gas : ETHANE

Ethane is the second largest component of natural gas after methane. Ethane’s main use is in the production of ethylene, a compound that is widely used in the chemical industry.

32 Andy’s son in Mayberry : OPIE

Mayberry is the fictional North Carolina town in which the “The Andy Griffith Show” is set. Mayberry is said to be based on Griffith’s own hometown of Mount Airy, North Carolina.

34 ASAP relative : PDQ

Pretty darn quick (PDQ)

38 *Extended engagement : LONG RUN (giving “long jump”)

The long jump was the only jumping event in the Olympic Games held in ancient Greece. There is some evidence that the original long jump differed from today’s event in that athletes were restricted to a very short run-up. They also carried a weight in each hand that was swung forward to increase the jumper’s momentum.

40 Baseball great Gehrig : LOU

Baseball legend Lou Gehrig was known as a powerhouse. He was a big hitter and just kept on playing. Gehrig broke the record for the most consecutive number of games played, and he still holds the record for the most career grand slams. His durability earned him the nickname “The Iron Horse”. Sadly, he died in 1941 at 37-years-old suffering from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), an illness we now call “Lou Gehrig’s Disease”. The New York Yankees retired the number four on 4th of July 1939 in his honor, making Lou Gehrig the first baseball player to have his number retired.

43 Mideast strip : GAZA

After the 1948 Arab-Israeli War, the boundaries of the strip of land on the Mediterranean around Gaza were fixed in the Israel-Egypt Armistice Agreement. The boundaries were specifically defined but were not to be recognized as an international border. From 1948, the Gaza Strip was occupied and administered by Egypt, until 1967 when Israel took over occupation following the Six-Day War. In 1993, Israel and the PLO signed the Oslo Accords which handed over administration to the Palestinian Authority, but with Israel retaining control of the Gaza Strip’s airspace, some land borders and its territorial waters. The intent was to further this agreement, but discussions between the parties broke down. Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005.

44 Toronto NBAer : RAPTOR

The Raptors are the NBA basketball team based in Toronto, Ontario. The franchise was founded, along with the Vancouver Grizzlies, when the NBA expanded into Canada in 1995. However, the Grizzlies moved to Memphis in 2001, leaving the Raptors as the only Canadian member of the league. The selection of the name “Raptors” in 1995 was strongly influenced by the popularity of the movie “Jurassic Park in the mid-nineties.

48 Beach Boys “Help Me” title girl : RHONDA

“Help Me, Rhonda” is a Beach Boys hit written by Brian Wilson and Mike Love, released in 1965. When the song was first issued as a track on the album “Today!”, the song was titled “Help Me, Ronda” (note the spelling of “Ronda”). When the song was released as a single a month later, the title used the spelling with which we are familiar: “Help Me, Rhonda”.

50 Whirling toon devil : TAZ

The “Looney Tunes” character known as the Tasmanian Devil, or “Taz”, first appeared in a cartoon short with Bugs Bunny called “Devil May Care” in 1954.

55 Pricey watches : OMEGAS

Omega is a manufacturer of high-end watches based in Switzerland. An Omega watch was the first portable timepiece to make it to the moon, Perhaps even more impressive is the fact that James Bond has been wearing an Omega watch in the movies since 1995.

61 Battery boost … and what the first part of the answers to starred clues can literally be : JUMP-START

On most cars using a 12V battery, the recommended sequence of connections used when jump-starting is:

  1. Dead battery positive terminal … to good battery positive terminal
  2. Good battery negative terminal … to bare metal on the dead car, as far away from the battery as possible.

The final connection is made to bare metal (like an engine mounting bolt) because such parts are connected to the negative terminal of the dead battery. The final connection is made away from the battery so that any spark created is less likely to ignite the explosive hydrogen gas that might be emitted by a battery.

64 Fronton game word : ALAI

A fronton is an open-walled playing area used for the sport of jai alai. Although most frontons in the US can be found in Florida, where the sport is most popular, the first jai alai fronton in the country was located in St. Louis. It opened there around the time of the 1904 World’s Fair.

65 Scrabble piece : TILE

The game of Scrabble has been produced in many international versions, and each of these editions has its own tile distribution to suit the local language. For example, in English we have two tiles worth ten points: one “Q” and one “Z”. If you play the game in French then there are five tiles worth ten points: one “K”, one “W”, one “X”, one “Y” and one “Z”.

66 Stringed instruments of yore : LYRES

The lyre is a stringed instrument that is most closely associated with ancient Greece, and with the gods Hermes and Apollo in particular. According to myth, Hermes slaughtered a cow from a sacred herd belonging to Apollo and offered it to the gods but kept the entrails. Hermes used the entrails to make strings that he stretched across the shell of a tortoise, creating the first lyre. Apollo liked the sound from the lyre and agreed to accept it as a trade for his herd of cattle.

67 Jalopy corrosion : RUST

The origins of our word “jalopy”, meaning “dilapidated, old motor car”, seem to have been lost in time, but the word has been around since the 1920s. One credible suggestion is that it comes from Xalapa, Mexico as the Xalapa scrap yards were the destination for many discarded American automobiles.

68 Historic British school : ETON

Eton College near Windsor in the south of England was founded way back in 1440 by King Henry VI. Originally known as “The King’s College of Our Lady of Eton besides Wyndsor”, the school was intended to provide free education to poor boys. Free education today at Eton? Not so much …

Down

1 “Shadow Dancing” singer Andy : GIBB

Andy was the younger brother of the brothers Gibb that made up the British band the Bee Gees. Andy pursued a successful solo career, but got himself into trouble with drug use. He died in 1988, just after his 30th birthday.

2 Indian tourist city : AGRA

Agra is a medieval city on the banks of the river Yamuna in India. Agra was also the capital of the Mughal Empire from 1556 to 1658. The city is home to three UNESCO World Heritage Sites:

  • The Taj Mahal: the famous mausoleum built in memory of Mumtaz Mahal.
  • Agra Fort: the site where the famous Koh-i-Noor diamond was seized.
  • Fatehpur Sikri: a historic city that’s home to well-preserved Mughal architecture.

6 MLB pitcher’s stat : ERA

Earned run average (ERA)

7 Stool pigeon : FINK

Stoolies, also called “canaries”, will sing to the cops given the right incentive. “Stoolie” is short for “stool pigeon”. A stool pigeon was a decoy bird tied to a stool so as to lure other pigeons. Originally a stoolie was a decoy for the police, rather than an informer, hence the name.

10 Subway immortalized in an Ellington song : A TRAIN

The A Train in the New York City Subway system runs from 207th Street, through Manhattan and over to Far Rockaway in Queens. The service lends its name to a jazz standard “Take the ‘A’ Train”, the signature tune of Duke Ellington and a song much sung by Ella Fitzgerald. One version of the lyrics are:

You must take the A Train
To go to Sugar Hill way up in Harlem
If you miss the A Train
You’ll find you’ve missed the quickest way to Harlem
Hurry, get on, now, it’s coming
Listen to those rails a-thrumming (All Aboard!)
Get on the A Train
Soon you will be on Sugar Hill in Harlem.

11 *Diamond defensive rarity : TRIPLE PLAY (giving “triple jump”)

In baseball, a triple play results in three outs, and the end of the inning.

12 Slightly inebriated : TIPSY

The term “tipsy” comes from the verb “to tip” meaning “to overturn, knock over”, and has been meaning “drunk” since the late 1500s.

22 India’s first prime minister : NEHRU

Jawaharlal Nehru was the first prime minister of India, serving from 1947-64. Nehru was basically the heir to his mentor Mahatma Gandhi. Nehru’s only daughter Indira, also became prime minister (known as Indira Gandhi through marriage, though she was not related to Mahatma).

26 Herbie of jazz : MANN

Herbie Mann was a Jewish-American flautist who was recognized as perhaps the greatest jazz flautist in the sixties. Mann recorded a best selling single called “Hijack” in 1975, which topped the disco charts for three weeks.

27 Hawkeye’s state : IOWA

Iowa is nicknamed the Hawkeye State in honor of Chief Black Hawk, a leader of the Sauk people during the War of 1812 and the Black Hawk War.

28 Health resorts : SPAS

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”.

29 *Vegas spender : HIGH ROLLER (giving “high jump”)

The high jump track-and-field event only dates back to the 19th century. Records suggest that the first competitive high jumping competition took place in Scotland.

31 Six-pointed star-shaped screw head : TORX

The common six-pointed, star-shaped screw drive is more correctly known as a Torx drive system. Tork screws were introduced by Camcar Textron in 1967 as a competitor/improvement to the popular Phillips screws.

33 Part of A.D. : ANNO

The designations Anno Domini (AD, “year of Our Lord”) and Before Christ (BC) are found in the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The dividing point between AD and BC is the year of the conception of Jesus, with AD 1 following 1 BC without a year “0” in between. The AD/BC scheme dates back to AD 525, and gained wide acceptance soon after AD 800. Nowadays a modified version has become popular, with CE (Common/Christian Era) used to replace AD, and BCE (Before the Common/Christian Era) used to replace BC.

36 Campus courtyard : QUAD

A university often features a central quadrangle (quad).

38 SoCal cop force : LAPD

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) is the third-largest local law enforcement agency in the country, after New York PD and Chicago PD. Among other things, LAPD is famous for creating the first Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) team in the US, in 1965.

43 Montreal daily : GAZETTE

“The Gazette” is an English-language daily newspaper published in Montreal. “The Gazette” was founded in 1778 and is the oldest newspaper in the whole province of Quebec.

45 “Tennis, __?” : ANYONE

The apparently innocent question “Tennis, anyone” is said to represent an uncaring attitude exhibited by many upper-class English people during the 1920s. The phrase was used on the stage at that time to contrast the terrible living conditions of the poor and the fixation that the gentry had on themselves.

47 Scottish toppers : TAMS

A tam o’shanter is a man’s cap traditionally worn by Scotsmen. “Tams” were originally all blue (and called “blue bonnets”) but as more dyes became readily available they became more colorful. The name of the cap comes from the title character of the Robert Burns poem “Tam O’Shanter”.

53 Not quite closed : AJAR

Our word “ajar” is thought to come from Scottish dialect, in which “a char” means “slightly open”.

54 Humdinger : LULU

We call a remarkable thing or a person a lulu. The term “lulu” was coined in honor of Lulu Hurst, the Georgia Wonder, who was a stage magician active in the 1880s.

A humdinger or a pip is someone or something outstanding. “Humdinger” is American slang dating back to the early 1900s, and was originally used to describe a particularly attractive woman.

57 “Alice’s Restaurant” singer Guthrie : ARLO

Arlo Guthrie is the son of Woody Guthrie. Both father and son are renowned for singing protest songs about social injustice. Arlo is most famous for his epic “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree”, a song that lasts a full 18m 34s. In the song Guthrie tells how, after being drafted, he was rejected for service in the Vietnam War based on his criminal record. He had only one incident on his public record, a Thanksgiving Day arrest for littering and being a public nuisance when he was 18-years-old.

58 British weapon acronym : STEN

The STEN gun is an iconic armament that was used by the British military. The name STEN is an acronym. The letters S and T come from the name of the gun’s designers, Shepherd and Turpin. The letters EN comes from the Enfield brand name, which in turn comes from the Enfield location where the guns were manufactured for the Royal Small Arms Factory, an enterprise owned by the British government.

60 ACLU concerns : RTS

Rights (rts.)

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) has its roots in the First World War. It grew out of the National Civil Liberties Bureau (CLB) that was founded to provide legal advice and support to conscientious objectors. The ACLU’s motto is “Because Freedom Can’t Protect Itself”. The ACLU also hosts a blog on the ACLU.org website called “Speak Freely”.

Complete List of Clues/Answers

Across

1 Spaces between teeth : GAPS
5 Comedian Foxworthy : JEFF
9 Flat finish : MATTE
14 Gershwin’s “__ Rhythm” : I GOT
15 Diva’s delivery : ARIA
16 Skylit courts : ATRIA
17 *Internet connection touted in the ’90s as faster than dial-up : BROADBAND (giving “broad jump”)
19 Leaks : DRIPS
20 Bill for beers : BAR TAB
21 Barbie’s beau : KEN
23 Church recess : APSE
24 4 x 4, for short : UTE
25 Brontë and Post : EMILYS
27 1987 Beatty/Hoffman bomb : ISHTAR
30 Flammable gas : ETHANE
32 Andy’s son in Mayberry : OPIE
33 Decorate : ADORN
34 ASAP relative : PDQ
37 Move back and forth, as a tail : WAG
38 *Extended engagement : LONG RUN (giving “long jump”)
40 Baseball great Gehrig : LOU
41 Remains of the tray? : ASH
42 Building addition : ANNEX
43 Mideast strip : GAZA
44 Toronto NBAer : RAPTOR
46 Remained : STAYED
48 Beach Boys “Help Me” title girl : RHONDA
50 Whirling toon devil : TAZ
51 Slippery : EELY
52 Bosom buddy : PAL
55 Pricey watches : OMEGAS
59 Bravery : VALOR
61 Battery boost … and what the first part of the answers to starred clues can literally be : JUMP-START
63 Happening : EVENT
64 Fronton game word : ALAI
65 Scrabble piece : TILE
66 Stringed instruments of yore : LYRES
67 Jalopy corrosion : RUST
68 Historic British school : ETON

Down

1 “Shadow Dancing” singer Andy : GIBB
2 Indian tourist city : AGRA
3 Below average : POOR
4 Law : STATUTE
5 Go on and on : JABBER
6 MLB pitcher’s stat : ERA
7 Stool pigeon : FINK
8 Lose luster, as colors : FADE
9 Fit to be tied : MAD
10 Subway immortalized in an Ellington song : A TRAIN
11 *Diamond defensive rarity : TRIPLE PLAY (giving “triple jump”)
12 Slightly inebriated : TIPSY
13 Subsides : EASES
18 Spreadsheet info : DATA
22 India’s first prime minister : NEHRU
26 Herbie of jazz : MANN
27 Hawkeye’s state : IOWA
28 Health resorts : SPAS
29 *Vegas spender : HIGH ROLLER (giving “high jump”)
30 Lawn care tool : EDGER
31 Six-pointed star-shaped screw head : TORX
33 Part of A.D. : ANNO
35 Catch a few z’s : DOZE
36 Campus courtyard : QUAD
38 SoCal cop force : LAPD
39 Like much bar beer : ON TAP
43 Montreal daily : GAZETTE
45 “Tennis, __?” : ANYONE
46 “Cut that out!” : STOP IT!
47 Scottish toppers : TAMS
48 Whoop it up : REVEL
49 Hard to lift : HEAVY
53 Not quite closed : AJAR
54 Humdinger : LULU
56 Canter or gallop : GAIT
57 “Alice’s Restaurant” singer Guthrie : ARLO
58 British weapon acronym : STEN
60 ACLU concerns : RTS
62 Pas’ partners : MAS