Arthur Schulman Interview, New Record, Over 8,800, 1984 Puzzles on XWord Info, and More Publicity

Last week's review by Rex Parker and Matt Gaffney of a pre-Shortzian puzzle was a big hit!  Thanks again, Rex and Matt, and thanks to everyone who stopped by (and especially to those of you who left comments)!

This week I'm thrilled to present a fascinating interview with Arthur Schulman, a prolific pre-Shortzian constructor and cognitive psychologist who (according to still-incomplete records) published 80 New York Times puzzles in the pre-Shortz era and 1 under Will Shortz's editorship.  To read the interview, click here or on the Pre-Shortzian Constructor Interviews tab above; to read "The Art of the Puzzler," the very interesting book chapter he mentions in the interview, click here.

During the course of this interview, I learned that Arthur's first published puzzle in The New York Times appeared when he was 18.  I wrote to Jim Horne about this discovery so he could update the teenage constructors page on XWord Info, and he contacted Will Shortz, who originally began tracking these data.  So we now have a new entry for the record books:  Arthur Schulman was the 21st-youngest constructor to publish a crossword in The New York Times!

In other news, on Sunday veteran litzer Denny Baker sent in a packet that put us over 8,800 on the litzing thermometer, and we've received so many packets this week from other litzers that we're now almost at 8,900!

Also, the proofread 1984 puzzles are now up on Xword Info—that makes 10 years of pre-Shortzian puzzles that are now available on Jim Horne's wonderful site!

The Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project received some more publicity this past week connected with the review by Rex Parker and Matt Gaffney:  Rex wrote about it here on Rex Parker Does the NY Times Crossword Puzzle, Matt mentioned it here on Facebook, and T Campbell discussed it here on Amy Reynaldo's Diary of a Crossword Fiend.  Several people tweeted about it as well, including Jeffrey Krasnick, Brendan Emmett Quigley, and Ben Tausig.  Thanks, everybody!

Today's featured pre-Shortzian puzzle was constructed by . . . (drumroll, please) . . . Arthur Schulman!  It was originally published on March 29, 1975, and was recently litzed by Howard Barkin.  This impressive 74-word themeless features a host of zippy entries such as SQUEEGEE, JAVA MAN, and METHANOL.  Oh , and I forgot to mention that the puzzle is a pangram—wow!  I've seen many fine William Lutwiniak pangrams from around this time period, but they've all had relatively closed-off grids with 76 or 78 words.  Another noteworthy feature of this puzzle is its relative absence of obscurity and crosswordese.  The crossing of HAKIM (clued as "Moslem judge") and KOP (clued as "African hill" instead of as "Keystone Kop") would've left me 41-Down, but the rest of the puzzle is very clean.  All in all, this is an exceptional Will Weng–edited themeless—I very much look forward to seeing the remainder of Arthur Schulman's puzzles as they get litzed!  The answer grid can be seen below:

On March 22, the entry of the week was the Norwegian town HAMMERFEST, which I thought sounded awesome but probably wouldn't be showing up a New York Times crossword again anytime soon.  Imagine my surprise when I was solving Julian Lim's Wednesday puzzle this week and saw the clue "Hammerfest's locale: Abbr." for NOR!  I wonder if this clue was written by the constructor or by Will Shortz himself—either way, I was delighted and had no trouble filling it in!

So this week I'm featuring another amazing-sounding city, HÄMEENLINNA.  HÄMEENLINNA was originally used in the January 13, 1973, puzzle (author unknown), which was recently litzed by Mark Diehl.  It was clued as "City in Finland"; Britannica mentions that Hämeenlinna's name was derived from the Häme castle and became the northernmost terminus of Finland's first railroad in 1862.  I look forward to seeing if "Hämeenlinna's locale: Abbr." shows up as a clue for FIN in the near future—that would be awesome!  For now, below is a picture of the Häme castle:

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

ACPT Wrap-Up, Dorothea E. Shipp Puzzle, "Twenty Under Thirty" Now Available, and Over 8,400

This will be another shorter and earlier post than usual, because I'm busy catching up with all the work I missed while at the ACPT—and tomorrow I'm leaving for the California Junior Classical League State Convention in Irvine.  My posting should get back to its regular schedule next week, though; in the meantime, the new Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project Twitter page will have any news that comes up between now and then!

First, the ACPT . . . it was awesome!  I had so much fun meeting, reuniting with, and talking to everybody!  The litzer get-together on Friday afternoon was more sparsely attended than I'd expected, since quite a few people had their flights delayed by the bad weather in New York.  Still, several litzers were able to stop by, and we made it through at least some of the Oreos (though I brought back an unopened package on the plane!).  I met up with other litzers later; all told, there were 15 litzers (including me) at the ACPT—Howard Barkin, Peter Broda, Joe Cabrera, Andrew Feist, Vic Fleming, Mangesh Ghogre, Angela Halsted, Jeffrey Harris, Jeffrey Krasnick (wearing his Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project T-shirt!), Andrew Laurence, Parker Lewis, Tom Pepper, Doug Peterson, and Brad Wilber!  (If I've left anyone out, please let me know—it was all a whirlwind!)  I'll be sure to schedule any future litzer parties for sometime later that weekend so everyone will have arrived.  Here are a few litzer photos:

Me wearing the Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project T-shirt

Me and Brad Wilber eating Oreos in the lounge!

Vic Fleming at the Oreo table

Howard Barkin in the tournament room

Jeffrey Krasnick in his Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project T-shirt

On Friday night, I gave a short talk about the Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project—you can see a video of it below (or here on YouTube)—just click on the arrow to play it.  (Warning:  The video is a bit shaky at first, but it gets better quickly.)

In the video, I mention a flyer with a Will Weng–edited puzzle.  Unfortunately, because of a mix-up, that wasn't available, but if you'd like to try your hand at the amazing Dorothea E. Shipp 23 x 23 puzzle "Every Which Way" that was on the back of the flyer, I've posted it on Scribd, and you can download it here.  I'll post the solution next week.

You can see more ACPT photos and videos (as well as lots of interesting results!) by scrolling down on the official tournament Web site here.

In other news, I'm delighted to report that Twenty Under Thirty is now available!  Twenty Under Thirty is a collection of crosswords edited by Ben Tausig and written by twenty constructors under the age of thirty, including three litzers—Peter Broda, me, and Alex Vratsanos!  A PDF of the book is $5 and will be e-mailed to you; to order a copy, click here.

Finally, even with all the events of this past week, the litzing continued!  On Sunday, Mark Diehl sent in 13 puzzles and put us over 8,400 on the litzing thermometer—at this rate, I think there's a chance we'll be finished with all the litzing (though not all the proofreading!) within the next year or so!  Thanks again, everybody!

In honor of Joe Krozel's amazing 18-blocker that will appear in tomorrow's New York Times, today's featured puzzle has the lowest block count I've seen so far in a pre-Shortzian puzzle:  23.  XWord Info lists just 7 puzzles that contain 23 blocks, all of which were published in the Shortz era when computer software was available.

This lovely Maleska-edited puzzle, which was constructed by Adelyn Lewis and litzed by Jeffrey Krasnick, was originally published on January 13, 1979.  The fill is almost junk-free, and the constructor even managed to throw in a repeated prefix theme consisting of four intersecting 15-letter entries—wow!  The fill's highlights include ARSONIST, DEEP-SET, and BAD TIMES (cleverly clued as "Depressions and recessions").  The partial DE SACS and the French TAVERNE aren't my favorites, but they're a small price to pay for an otherwise brilliant, ahead-of-its-time puzzle!  The answer grid (with highlighted theme entries) can be seen below:

I can imagine that many solvers took offense at the entry WETBACK, which appeared in the May 27, 1986, puzzle by Burns (first name unknown) that was recently litzed by Bob Jones.  Maleska's clue for WETBACK was simply "Illegal border crosser."  However, I also encountered the entry WETBACK (at 1-Across) in the May 7, 1951, puzzle by Jack Luzzatto, which was recently litzed by yours truly.  I couldn't believe that Margaret Farrar published the clue "Mexican smuggled over the Rio Grande"!  The breakfast test must have had a very different meaning back in 1951.

On a more positive note, I saw a very clever clue for ANT in the March 24, 1951, puzzle by Harold T. Bers, which I also litzed:  "Small red socialist."  This clue was not only very current but also exceedingly clever for its time.  Bravo, Mr. Bers!  Below is a picture of a red ant:

Image courtesy of Southern Fire Ant Control.