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Max Baer Jr., Betty Garrett, Earl Holliman, Margaret O’Brien, Lyman Ward, Marie Windsor, and Jane Withers, all in the Murder, She Wrote episode “Who Killed J.B. Fletcher?” (February 10, 1991). Familiar faces in new arrangements: one of the pleasures of television.

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All OCA pleasures of television posts (Pinboard)

Billie Holiday’s residence

[286 West 142nd Street, Harlem, New York City, c. 1939–1941. From the NYC Municipal Archives Collections. Click for a much larger view.]

“At the height of her career she lived at 286 West 142nd Street”: The Encyclopedia of New York City (2010). And there she is in the 1940 Manhattan telephone directory:



Those buildings are gone now.

*

February 13: An assidious reader found the apartment number: 2E. And found Billie and her mother Sadie in the 1940 census. Also in 2E: a lodger, Irene Wilson, née Kitchings, co-composer of “Some Other Spring” and other songs. Thanks, reader.

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All OCA Billie Holiday posts (Pinboard) : More photographs from the NYC Municipal Archives (Pinboard)

Today’s Saturday Stumper

Today’s Newsday  Saturday Stumper is by Matthew Sewell, and it’s a doozy, perhaps the most difficult Stumper I’ve ever done, though there’s nothing outré, nothing strained.

I started with four-letter words, 1-A, “Rock Hall honorees inducted by the Bee Gees”; 1-D, “What Michael Jackson wore in The Wiz ”; and 2-D, letters, “Tik-Tok coiner (for a 1907 kids’ book).” And then I wandered and stumbled. I didn’t think I’d get it all until I filled in my last answer, another four-letter word: 57-A, four letters, “Big 12 invite accepter for 2024.”

Some clue-and-answer pairs of note:

12-D, ten letters, “Spills a lot.” Hah.

15-D, six letters, “Franchise element.” I was thinking of, say, Dairy Queens and owner-operators.

17-A, ten letters, “Grand Canyon run gear.” How's one supposed to run in the Grand Canyon?

23-A, twelve letters, “Mexican wrestling accouterment.” All those hours of UHF television paying off at last.

27-D, ten letters, “Blocked by booming.” Lordy.

28-D, ten letters, “Illuminating accent.” The novelty of this answer made me laugh.

29-A, seven letters, “Tokyo monorail maker (1964).” I had one letter from a cross, figured that there are companies that make everything, and guessed, correctly.

40-A, seven letters, “Comes back.” Tricky.

42-D, six letters, “First noun in Richard III.” Of course.

48-D, four letters, “Shelley’s ‘love disguised.’” I take every Shelley clue in a crossword as something like a hello from my late friend Rob Zseleczky.

52-A, ten letters, “Analphabetic.” I thought it had something to do with being out of alphabetical order.

56-A, ten letters, “Written up earlier.” Whew.

My favorite in this puzzle: 10-D, six letters, “Word from Greek for ‘tattoo.’”

No spoilers; the answers are in the comments.

Zembla casts a spell

I forgot about this screenshot, from Monday’s New York Times Spelling Bee. Somehow I think there must have been more than just this one reader of Vladimir Nabokov’s 1962 novel Pale Fire who had to — had to — spell out Zembla. Zembla, in the words of Nabokov’s narrator Charles Kinbote, is “a distant northern land.” The Bee has also rejected alembic, aporia, and propitiatory. Unlike Zembla , they’re all legit words.

The pangram from Monday’s puzzle: BAMBOOZLE.

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Recently updated

Brew , broth , bread  Now with beer .

Grand old plays and sewing machines

President Harvey of the Alma Hettrick College for Girls (“a chubby, happy man who liked to have the students call him Butch”) is addressing the faculty as the fall term begins:

Jean Stafford, “Caveat Emptor” (1956), in Collected Stories (1969).

The student as customer: President Harvey was ahead of his time.

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Brew , broth , bread

Oh the things we talk about at the breakfast table (which later turns into the lunch table and then the dinner table):

Could brew and broth be related? Ask Merriam-Webster:

Brew :

Middle English, from Old English brēowan; akin to Latin fervēre to boil — more at BARM

And broth :

Middle English, from Old English; akin to Old High German brod broth, Old English brēowan to brew — more at BREW

And what about bread ?

Middle English breed , from Old English brēad ; akin to Old High German brōt bread, Old English brēowan to brew

So yes, and yes again.

*

And there’s beer:

Middle English ber, going back to Old English bēor, akin to Old High German bior “beer,” Old Norse bjórr; perhaps all going back to a dissimilated form of Germanic *breura-, a nominal derivative of *brewwan- “to BREW entry 1”

Thanks, Elaine.

Taylor Swift and the apostrophe

The New York Times addresses a burning question of the day: Should there be an apostrophe in the title of Taylor Swift’s forthcoming album Tortured Poets Department ?

I say the title is fine without. I’d liken the phrase to “current events podcast” or “retired teachers association.” Or, say, “Elks convention.” No apostrophe needed.

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[Something to distract myself as the Supreme Court considers the real burning question of the day.]

Luis Buñuel, MoMA hiree

Did Luis Buñuel really work at the Museum of Modern Art? Yes, he did.

This exchange, as recounted by Buñuel, makes me think of what Zippy might say if he were to interview for a job. The interviewer was Nelson Rockefeller:

When he asked if I was a Communist, I told him I was a Republican, and at the end of the conversation, I found myself working for The Museum of Modern Art.

“Pickleball infrastructure?”

[“Wrap Battle.” Zippy, February 8, 2024. Click for a larger view.]

I heard the phrase “pickleball infrastructure” while listening to NPR in December and immediately thought of it as an “over and over,” the kind of thing Zippy might like to repeat. I sent the phrase to Bill Griffith. He liked it, and here it is in today’s Zippy. I’m thrilled. Please click through to the strip and notice what’s in the third panel.

Bill put a name to such repetition in a recent strip: palilogia, also known as epizeuxis. Think of King Lear’s agonized “Never, never, never, never, never.” Or Steve Ballmer’s mildly insane “Developers, developers, developers, developers.” Or Zippy’s carefree “Pickleball infrastructure! Pickleball infrastructure! Pickleball infrastructure!”

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