Category: Jamey Smith

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Constructed by: Jamey Smith
Edited by: Patti Varol

Today’s Reveal Answer: Pen Names

Themed answers each start with the NAME of a PEN:

• 64A Writers’ aliases, and what are found at the starts of the answers to the starred clues : PEN NAMES

• 17A *High-intensity workout regimen : CROSSFIT (Cross pen)
• 25A *Feasibility assessment of a large project : PILOT STUDY (Pilot pen)
• 39A *Buttery choice in a bread basket : PARKER HOUSE ROLL (Parker pen)
• 51A *Pattern inspired by nature : ZEBRA PRINT (Zebra pen)

Read on, or jump to …
… a complete list of answers

Bill’s time: 6m 59s

Bill’s errors: 0

Today’s Wiki-est Amazonian Googlies

Across

1 Cornfield cry : CAW!

A caw is the harsh cry of a crow, and crows might be found in fields of corn …

4 Insect whose larvae eat clothes : MOTH

The larvae of several types of moth are noted for eating fabrics made from natural fibers such as wool or cotton. Many people store woolens in cedar chests believing that the scent of the wood prevents a moth infestation. In fact, the only known effective repellent is the naphthalene found in mothballs, which might be a health concern for humans. One way to kill moth larvae in fabric is to freeze the garment for several days at a temperature below -8 degrees celsius.

8 Hawaiian dances : HULAS

The hula is a native dance of Hawaii that uses arm movements to relate a story. The hula can be performed while sitting (a noho dance) or while standing (a luna dance).

13 German cry : ACH!

The German exclamation “ach!” is usually translated into English as “oh!”

15 “And so on” : ETC ETC

The Latin phrase “et cetera” translates as “and other things”. The term is usually abbreviated to “etc.”

17 *High-intensity workout regimen : CROSSFIT (Cross pen)

CrossFit is a trademarked fitness, strength and conditioning program that was introduced in 2000.

A. T. Cross is a company that claims to be the oldest manufacturer of fine pens. Cross was founded in 1846 in Providence, Rhode Island by one Richard Cross. Richard passed the company on to his son Alonzo T. Cross, who gave it the current name.

19 Radio tuner : AM DIAL

In telecommunications, a radio signal is transmitted using a sinusoidal carrier wave. Information is transmitted using this carrier wave in two main ways, by varying (modulating) the instantaneous amplitude (signal strength) of the carrier wave, and by modulating the instantaneous frequency of the carrier wave. The former is referred to as an AM signal (“amplitude modulation”), and the latter as an FM signal (“frequency modulation”).

20 Oodles : HEAPS

It’s thought that the term “oodles”, meaning “a lot”, comes from “kit and caboodle”.

24 “¿Cómo __ usted?” : ESTA

“¿Cómo está usted?” is the more formal way of asking “How are you?” in Spanish.

25 *Feasibility assessment of a large project : PILOT STUDY (Pilot pen)

Pilot is a Japanese pen company, and the largest manufacturer of pens in Japan. The “Pilot” name was adopted in 1938, a change from the original Namiki Manufacturing Company.

27 RN’s needle : HYPO

Anything described as hypodermic (such as “hypodermic needle”) is related to parts under the skin. The term “hypodermic” comes from the Greek “hypo-” meaning “under” and “derma” meaning “skin”.

Registered nurse (RN)

29 Guthrie’s “Today” co-anchor : KOTB

Hoda Kotb is an Egyptian-American television journalist who is perhaps best known as a co-host of the NBC morning show “Today”. She is also the author of the bestselling autobiography “Hoda: How I Survived War Zones, Bad Hair, Cancer, and Kathie Lee”.

Savannah Guthrie is a broadcast journalist who started to co-anchor the NBC news show “Today” in 2012. Although raised in Arizona. Guthrie was actually born in Melbourne, Australia.

32 Swiss biotech giant : ROCHE

The giant pharmaceutical and medical diagnostics company Hoffmann-La Roche is based in Basel, Switzerland. The company was founded back in 1896 by Fritz Hoffmann-La Roche, and initially produced vitamins.

35 “A Death in the Family” writer James : AGEE

“A Death in the Family” is a 1957 novel by James Agee. It is about the death of a father and the impact it has on his family. The novel won a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1958, and was adapted into a 1963 film “All the Way Home” starring Jean Simmons and Robert Preston.

39 *Buttery choice in a bread basket : PARKER HOUSE ROLL (Parker pen)

Parker House rolls are so called because they were invented at the Parker House Hotel in Boston in the 1870s. A peculiarity of the roll is its shape. The ball of dough is flattened into an oval shape with a rolling pin, and then the oval is folded in half.

The Parker Pen Company was founded in 1888 in Janesville, Wisconsin by George Safford Parker. Parker had repaired and sold fountain pens as a sideline for many years. With this experience, he created pens that were less likely to leak ink and founded his company based on these patented designs.

43 Boardroom bigwig : EXEC

A bigwig is someone important. The use of the term “bigwig” harks back to the days when men of authority and rank wore … big wigs.

44 Pink Lady, for one : APPLE

The trademark “Pink Lady” applies to several cultivars of apple, most notably the Cripps Pink. The Cripps Pink is a cross between a Lady Williams and a Golden Delicious, and is named for John Cripps, the British-Australian horticulturist who came up with the original cultivar.

51 *Pattern inspired by nature : ZEBRA PRINT (Zebra pen)

Zebra, the pen company, was founded in Japan in 1914.

59 Eclectic musician Brian : ENO

Brian Eno is a musician, composer and record producer from England who first achieved fame as the synthesizer player with Roxy Music. As a producer, Eno has worked with David Bowie, Devo, Talking Heads and U2.

60 Biscayne Bay city : MIAMI

The city of Miami in Florida takes its name from the nearby Miami River, which is itself named for the Mayaimi Native American people who lived around nearby Lake Okeechobee.

Biscayne Bay is a lagoon in South Florida on the Atlantic coast.

66 Bring down on the gridiron : TACKLE

We never used the word “gridiron” when I was growing up in Ireland (meaning a grill used for cooking food over an open fire). So, maybe I am excused for taking two decades living in the US to work out that a football field gridiron is so called because the layout of yard lines over the field looks like a gridiron used in cooking.

71 __ race : RAT

We use “rat race” figuratively to describe an endless, pointless pursuit. The term comes from the laboratory, where one might imagine rats racing around a maze in search of some cheese.

Down

1 Hidden stockpile : CACHE

A cache is a secret supply. We imported the term “cache” into English from French-Canadian trappers in the 17th century. Back then, “cache” was slang for “hiding place for stores”, derived from the French verb “cacher” meaning “to hide”.

2 Central Park’s 843 : ACRES

The man most associated with the decision to develop Central Park in New York City was William Cullen Bryant, the editor of what today is the “New York Post”. He argued that the growing city needed a large, public open space, along the lines of Hyde Park in London and the Bois de Boulogne in Paris. Most of the park’s construction took place between 1860 and 1873. Much of the clearing work was accomplished using gunpowder, and it is often noted that more gunpowder was used in Central Park than in the Battle of Gettysburg.

4 Component of momentum : MASS

In physics, momentum is a property of a moving body that is calculated by multiplying the body’s mass by its velocity. Conceptually, it is a property that defines the length of time it would take to bring the moving body to rest by applying a constant force. The greater the mass and the greater the velocity, the harder it is to bring the body to rest, i.e. the greater is the body’s momentum.

6 “If I Had a Hammer” singer Lopez : TRINI

Trini Lopez is a noted singer and guitarist from Dallas, Texas. He is perhaps best known for his international hit “If I Had a Hammer” from 1963, as well as “Lemon Tree” from 1965. Lopez had a bit of an acting career as well, most famously appearing as one of “The Dirty Dozen” in the 1967 hit movie.

“If I Had a Hammer” is a song written in 1949 by Pete Seeger and Lee Hays. The song has been released by many artists, but my guess would be that the most famous recordings are by Peter, Paul and Mary in 1962, and by Trini Lopez in 1963.

7 Bellhop’s employer : HOTEL

A bell captain supervises bellhops in a hotel. The term “bellhop” comes from the fact that the front desk clerk used to ring a “bell” to summon a porter, who then “hopped” to attention and received his or her instructions.

10 HDTV choice : LCD

Liquid Crystal Displays (LCDs) are the screens that are found in most laptops today, and in flat panel computer screens and some televisions. LCD monitors basically replaced Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) screens, the old television technology.

16 Court surface for tennis’s French Open : CLAY

There are four different surfaces used for playing tennis competitively:

• Clay courts (used for the French Open)
• Hard courts (used for the US Open and the Australian Open)
• Grass courts (used for Wimbledon)
• Carpet courts

18 Fix, as a pet : SPAY

Our verb “to spay”, meaning “to surgically remove the ovaries of” (an animal), comes from an old Anglo-French word “espeier” meaning “to cut with a sword”.

26 Letter-shaped ski lift : T-BAR

A T-bar is a ski lift on which the skiers are pulled up the hill in pairs, with each pair standing (not sitting!) either side of a T-shaped metal bar. The bar is placed behind the thighs, pulling along the skiers as they remain standing on their skis (hopefully!). There’s also a J-bar, which is a similar device but with each J-shaped bar used by one skier at a time.

30 “Gorillas in the Mist” primate : APE

“Gorillas in the Mist” is a 1988 film that tells the story of naturalist Dian Fossey’s work with mountain gorillas in Rwanda. The movie is based on Fossey’s 1983 book of the same name, and features Sigourney Weaver playing the lead.

33 Yoga energy point : CHAKRA

Chakras are energy centers in the body that are believed to correspond to different aspects of the physical, emotional, and spiritual self. There are seven main chakras, located along the spine from the base of the spine to the crown of the head. Each chakra is associated with a different color, element, and emotion.

36 Ice cream brand with a truck logo : GOOD HUMOR

Good Humor is an ice cream brand that was founded in Youngstown, Ohio in 1920. The Good Humor company introduced the first ice cream on a stick, and the first ice cream truck.

37 Blight-stricken tree species : ELM

Dutch elm disease is a fungus devastating to all species of elm trees that is transmitted by the elm bark beetle. The disease is thought to have originated in Asia and is now rampant in Europe and North America. Even though there is a hybrid of elm known as the Dutch elm, the disease isn’t named after the tree. Rather, the disease is called “Dutch” as it was identified in 1921 by a phytopathologist (plant pathologist) in the Netherlands.

38 Trains that rumble overhead : ELS

Elevated railroad (El)

40 1980s Chrysler compact : K-CAR

Chrysler introduced K-cars in the early 1980s at a time when demand for large cars with V8 engines was plummeting. Post-oil crisis consumers were seeking low-cost, fuel-efficient vehicles, which brought Chrysler to the brink of bankruptcy. It was the economical 4-cylinder, front-wheel drive platform that singlehandedly delivered the company into profitability within a couple of years. K-cars were designed to carry 6 passengers, on two bench seats. Remember taking a corner a little too fast on those seats, in the days when no one wore seat belts?

42 Brain scan letters : EEG

An electroencephalogram (EEG) is a record of electrical activity caused by the firing of neurons within the brain. The EEG might be used to diagnose epilepsy, or perhaps to determine if a patient is “brain dead”.

47 Skywalker player : HAMILL

Actor Mark Hamill is best known (by far) for playing Luke Skywalker in “Star Wars” movies. That said, fans of “Batman: The Animated Series” will know him as the voice actor behind the Joker.

50 Blues Hall of Famer James : ETTA

“Etta James” was the stage name of celebrated blues and soul singer Jamesetta Hawkins. James’ most famous recording was her 1960 hit “At Last”, which made it into the pop charts. James performed “At Last” at the age of 71 in 2009 on the reality show “Dancing with the Stars”, which was to be her final television appearance. She passed away in 2012.

Inaugurated in 1980, the Blues Hall of Fame used to be just a list of people who made significant contributions to the blues genre of music. There is now a music museum with the name Blues Hall of Fame, located in Memphis.

52 Room-sized early computer : ENIAC

The acronym ENIAC stands for Electronic Numerical Integrator and Calculator (although many folks insist that the C was for “Computer”). ENIAC was introduced at the University of Pennsylvania in 1946, at which time it was the first general-purpose electronic computer, and dubbed “Giant Brain” by the press. Its original purpose was the calculation of artillery firing tables, but it ended up being used early on to make calculations necessary for the development of the hydrogen bomb. Given its uses, it’s not surprising to hear that development of ENIAC was funded by the US Army during WWII.

55 Dorothy, to Auntie Em : NIECE

In the children’s novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” by L. Frank Baum, Dorothy Gale lives with her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry.

57 Portland’s Moda Center, e.g. : ARENA

Portland’s Moda Center is a multipurpose arena that was primarily built to host the Trail Blazers, the city’s NBA team. When the arena opened for business in 1995, it was known as the “Rose Garden”, reflecting Portland’s reputation as the “Rose City”.

61 Chicago-style pizza chain, familiarly : UNO’S

The chain of pizza parlors known today as Uno Chicago Grill used to be called Pizzeria Uno, or just “Uno’s”. Apparently, Uno’s created the world’s first deep-dish pizza.

65 British medical sys. : NHS

The UK introduced the National Health Service (NHS) in 1948 as part of a packet of major social reforms introduced in the wake of the Second World War. The NHS is mainly funded by National Insurance contributions (similar to, but more expansive than, Social Security contributions in the US). National Insurance contributions basically fund the UK’s universal healthcare program, public pension program and unemployment benefits.