Interview with Charles M. Deber, New Litzer of the Month John Farmer, Susan O'Brien's Research, Howard Barkin's Crossword Compiler 9 Tip, and More Publicity

Today I'm delighted to present a fascinating interview with pre-Shortzian and Shortz-era constructor Charles M. Deber!  Charles is a research scientist in Toronto who has published 37 puzzles in The New York Times (35 of them Sundays!) and still builds his puzzles by hand.  To read his interview, click here or on the Pre-Shortzian Constructor Interviews tab above.

We also have a new Litzer of the Month:  John Farmer!  John is a New York Times constructor with many interests who runs more than 100 miles a month.  To read more about him, click here or on the Litzer of the Month tab above.

Shortly after last week's post came up, John sent in 8 puzzles.  Then Friday evening, I litzed a reassigned Sunday puzzle and put us at 15,900 on the litzing thermometer!  Saturday afternoon, new litzer George Barany sent in 1 puzzle.  Sunday afternoon, Todd Gross sent in 11 proofread puzzles, which were followed that evening by 3 litzed puzzles from Mike Buckley.  Monday morning, new litzer Jon Delfin sent 1 puzzle, which was followed by 2 more from Lynn Feigenbaum that afternoon.  Then Thursday morning, Tracy Bennett sent in another month of proofread puzzles, and late that night, Mark Diehl sent in 12 more litzed puzzles.  And this week Howard Barkin sent in two more months of proofread puzzles!  Thanks so much again, everybody—we're now at 15,919 on the litzing thermometer!

Great news:  Two more litzers decided to try proofreading this week and received their first packets:  Jeffrey Krasnick and Lynn Feigenbaum!  We have thousands of puzzles that need proofreading, so please let me know if you'd like to try the fun but diabolical proofreading self-test!

This week some new bios came in for the Meet the Litzers page—the following people now appear there:  Stephen Edward Anderson, George Barany, Tracy Bennett, Peter Broda, Ralph Bunker, Jeff Chen, Mark Diehl, Vic Fleming, Mangesh Ghogre, Todd Gross, Barry Haldiman, Angela Halsted, Garrett Hildebrand, Nancy Kavanaugh, Roy Leban, Matthew Mitchell (Braze), Adam Nicolle, Doug Peterson, me, Alex Vratsanos, Larry Wasser, and Brad Wilber.  Some litzers and proofreaders who don't have bios on the Meet the Litzers page have appeared on the Litzer of the Month page or in articles elsewhere on the site.  If you're a litzer or proofreader who hasn't yet sent in a bio and photo specifically for the Meet the Litzers page and would like to, please e-mail them to me.  (Also, if you'd like to update your current bio, please send me the new information, and I'll make the changes.)

This week I received an e-mail from litzer Susan O'Brien, who decided to research the missing pre-Shortzian puzzles by querying the New York Public Library to see whether it had the International edition of The New York Times.  Unfortunately, she received this response:

"The New York Public Library only subscribes to the Late City edition. Even the microfilm collection of The New York Times is that of the Late City edition, as is the various database platforms (such as, the "ProQuest Historical Newspapers: The New York Times (1851-2010) with Index (1851-1993)."

Even though this was a dead end, it was still very helpful, because it's one potential avenue we can cross off our list.  Thanks so much again for checking this out, Susan!  I'll be doing some more research myself this summer on the missing puzzles, and I'm hoping to have better news to report at a later date.

I also received an e-mail from litzer (and now proofreader!) Howard Barkin this week in which he shared the following very timely tip about Crossword Compiler 9:

A helpful note, grid mistakes can be corrected (In Crossword Compiler 9, at least) without further clue issues by enabling the option in Options->Preferences, Clue Editing tab, "Changing grid does not delete clue".

I don't know how many times I've found a grid mistake while proofreading, then corrected it (which deletes the affected clues), and then had to retype in the clues!  This is a great tip, Howard—thanks so much again!

The Pre-Shortzian Puzzle Project got some more publicity yesterday!  It was part of an article Kasey Dallman wrote about the Davidson Fellows for Amazing Kids! Magazine—to read it, click here and scroll down.

Today's featured puzzle, "Playing the Angles," which can be solved on XWord Info, was constructed by Charles M. Deber, published April 4, 1982, and litzed by Barry Haldiman (or one of his former team of litzers).  This brilliant, complex construction, which was Charles's New York Times debut, features ten in-the-language, symmetrically arranged theme entries that relate to directions, bending around corners, or overcrowding, such as UP AGAINST THE WALL, AROUND THE HORN, and MAKE ROOM FOR DADDY.  The catch is that each of these entries turns 90 degrees midway through the entry and continues in a different direction!  I've seen puzzles with entries that twist and turn in more recent years, but I believe this puzzle is the earliest example of such a clever gimmick.  What's even more amazing is that this puzzle was constructed entirely by hand—it must have been a real challenge to produce a grid that accommodated for both the vertical and horizontal components of each theme entry!

Deber not only produced such a grid but also was able to make the fill largely junk-free!  I don't love the partials MILE A, AT EIGHT, or TO HER, and UME, RIE, RESCH, and GLOSSIC seem a bit tough, but these entries are a small price to pay for the groundbreaking theme and fun entries like HOT SPOT, TOUCANS, and PULSATES.  I also find it funny that 1-Across starts with a C and 5-Across is DEBAR (sort of like C. Deber!)—I wonder if this was intentional!  And although I'm not familiar with BOUFFES (clued as "Comic operas"), it's a lot of fun to say and looks really cool in the grid!  Merriam-Webster notes that BOUFFE is short for opéra bouffe, which means "a satirical comic opera" and ultimately derives from the Italian opera buffa.  The etymology of the word TRULL ("Strumpet"), an old-fashioned term for a woman of loose morals, is also fascinating—it ultimately derives from the Old French troller, which meant "to hunt for game without a scent or path."  At some point in the 1500s, someone must have interpreted the aimless hunter as the woman with loose morals and the game as the men she interacted with!  In all, this is a thematically exceptional pre-Shortzian puzzle that added several new words to my vocabulary.  The puzzle can be viewed and analyzed on XWord Info, where Jim Horne made this unusual gimmick look awesome!  The answer grid (with highlighted theme entries) can also be seen below, although the grid is numbered slightly differently in the PDF (and XWord Info) versions.

Project Milestone: No More Packets, One-Puzzle Litzing Challenge Update, Proofreading, Better Links, and Todd Gross's Research on Constructors

I'm delighted to announce that this week we reached a major milestone in the project:  As announced on Cruciverb-l, Twitter, and Facebook, on Monday I sent out the final packet of puzzles for litzing (appropriately enough, to crossword historian Lynn Feigenbaum!)!  It's amazing to finally be here—I've had the honor and privilege of working with an incredible group of people, and together we've accomplished something that will be of great value to cruciverbalists and others everywhere, now and in the future!  Thanks so much again, everyone!

Several litzers have commented on the bittersweet nature of this achievement—although finally having reached it is exciting, seeing this stage come to an end is also a bit sad.  Luckily, we have nearly 35 years of puzzles left to proofread, so the project will continue for a long time to come!  I also plan to keep this blog going even after the proofreading is done—there are countless interesting puzzles left to feature, trends to discuss, and constructors to profile!

So, on to the puzzles:  The week started off with 4 puzzles from Denny Baker on Friday evening.  Saturday morning, Joe Cabrera sent 4 more, and that afternoon, new litzer Mel Rosen sent in 1 puzzle.  Early Sunday morning, Todd Gross sent in 10 proofread puzzles, which were followed a few hours later by 4 litzed puzzles from Todd McClary and 4 more from Denny.  That afternoon, new litzers Jeff Chen and Adam Nicolle each sent in 1 puzzle; that night, new litzer Andrew Reynolds sent 1 as well.  Monday morning, new litzer Stephanie Spadaccini sent 1 puzzle; late that afternoon, Lynn Feigenbaum sent 4 more puzzles, which were followed by 4 more from Mike Buckley.  That night, Todd sent 11 more proofread puzzles.  Tuesday afternoon, Joe sent 4 more puzzles, putting his total at more than 200 litzed puzzles—congratulations, Joe!  Later that afternoon, new litzer Bryan Young sent 1 puzzle, which was followed by 4 more from Denny.  Wednesday morning, Todd sent 10 more proofread puzzles, and then Susan O'Brien sent 4 more litzed puzzles.  Thursday morning, Barry Haldiman sent 4 puzzles, which were followed by 4 more from Denny that afternoon, and 8 more from Mark Diehl late that night.  Early Friday morning, Lynn sent 2 more puzzles, which were followed 1 from new litzer Matthew Mitchell (Braze) and 10 more proofread puzzles from Todd a few hours later.  And this week Howard Barkin sent in 8 more puzzles.  Thanks so much again, everyone—we're now at 15,891 on the litzing thermometer, so there are still plenty of puzzles that have yet to come in!

I'm happy to report that this week several more people accepted the One-Puzzle Litzing Challenge:  George Barany, Jon Delfin, Matthew Mitchell (Braze), Adam Nicolle, and Matt Skoczen.  Adam and Braze also sent in their bios, which you can read by clicking on their names or going to the Meet the Litzers page.

Six litzers have also expressed an interest in proofreading, and a couple of days ago prodigious litzer Howard Barkin officially joined the proofreader ranks and received his first packet!  If you'd like to try the proofreading self-test and see if you have a knack for proofreading and enjoy it, let me know.  The self-test contains complete instructions, a puzzle with many more mistakes than would ever appear in a real puzzle, and an answer key.  Although stylistic matters such as the number of underscores or the types of dashes are important, what's key is catching grid mistakes and incorrect, misspelled, or omitted words in clues.  So if you take the self-test and do well on those sorts of things but miss some of the others and would still like to proofread, that's perfectly fine!  Every proofreader we have (including me!) has made a proofreading mistake here and there; luckily, some of those have been caught by sharp-eyed solvers on XWord Info!

We've been busy at litzer central improving some of the links on the site.  Previously when you clicked on one of the Litzing Crew, Litzers of the Month, or Constructor Interviews names in the righthand column, you landed at the top of the respective page and had to scroll down to find the name you were looking for.  Now you'll land on the specific person you wanted to read about, which should make navigating the site not only better but faster!  You'll still be able to scroll up and down within these pages to read about other people.

I've begun making similar changes within individual posts to links that led to these pages.  As I was updating the links to Litzer of the Month interviews from individual posts, I was dismayed to discover that I had inadvertently forgotten to mention three Litzer of the Month interviews, though the interviews were there and I had written blurbs for the sidebar feature that appeared at the beginning of each of those months.  My apologies to Ralph Bunker, December 2013 Litzer of the Month; Todd Gross, April 2013 Litzer of the Month; and Andrew Feist, August 2012 Litzer of the Month!  I've gone back to the posts the announcements should have been in and updated them.  If you didn't happen to link to the interviews from the sidebar gadget at the time, check them out now by clicking on each of the linked names above.

A couple of weeks ago, researcher extraordinaire Todd Gross e-mailed me about his findings on pre-Shortzian constructors.  Todd had come across something called THE Crossword (divided into THE Daily Crossword and THE Sunday Crossword) and discovered that many pre-Shortzian constructors—including William Lutwiniak, Jack Luzzatto, Tap Osborn, Herb L. Risteen, and Mel Rosen—were among the authors of these puzzles!

Using Google News, Todd was able to find one newspaper—the Bangor Daily News—that seemed to have most of THE Daily Crosswords, starting in April 1974.  Todd noted that, in addition to the more well-known pre-Shortzian male constructors, there were also many he was not familiar with, including a surprisingly large number of female constructors, such as Lucille Bowers and Sophie Fierman (both of whom were pre-Shortzian New York Times constructors) and Anne Halloran and Irene Sekula.

A Jack Luzzatto puzzle from the Bangor Daily News.

Todd tried to learn more about THE Crossword and discovered that it was likely created by the "Chicago Tribune New York News Syndicate" and edited by prolific pre-Shortzian New York Times constructor Herb Ettenson.  Todd found an obituary of Herb Ettenson, which you can read by clicking on his name (or by going to the new link on the Pre-Shortzian Constructors page), as well as an article written while Ettenson was still alive.  Apparently Ettenson was editor from approximately 1975 to 1997, when Wayne Robert Williams took over.

Todd wrote:  "So far I have a list of about 40 constructors and a few hundred puzzles.  Looks like Herb mostly stuck with constructors he knew, but rotated between them pretty thoroughly.  In particular, it looks like he made sure no constructor had two dailies in one week.  This makes sense to avoid confusion and mistakes in the syndicated papers."

Todd hadn't yet looked up the Sunday papers but knew that Ettenson did those as well.  Since the Bangor Daily News didn't have a Sunday edition, Todd is hoping to find another paper for those.

Todd also found a fascinating obituary for legendary pre-Shortzian and Shortz-era constructor Frances Hansen; click here to read it (or go to the link on the Pre-Shortzian Constructors page).

Frances Hansen, courtesy of Lloyd Mazer.

Awesome job researching, Todd—thanks so much for these terrific finds!