WEBVTT - Short Stuff: The NY Times Crossword 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:06.600 Hey, you're welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh. There's Chuck, 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:09.960 just Josh and Chuck. No, Jerry's short stuff. Go. New 0:00:10.039 --> 0:00:14.319 York Times crossword puzzle stumps Americans. That was a good one. 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:17.760 Mid Atlantic accent is what they call that. Yeah, we're 0:00:17.800 --> 0:00:21.480 talking about the New York Times Daily Crossword. A crossword 0:00:21.480 --> 0:00:25.000 puzzle I have never attempted to do in my life, 0:00:25.880 --> 0:00:28.560 but it is a part of the fabric of America. 0:00:28.880 --> 0:00:30.920 And there's a great documentary that I have have not seen 0:00:31.000 --> 0:00:33.040 yet that I want to see about this. I think 0:00:33.040 --> 0:00:36.879 it's about all crosswords. Yeah, I want to see that. 0:00:36.920 --> 0:00:40.440 It's called word Play. Yeah, that's the one. Yeah. Sure. 0:00:41.000 --> 0:00:44.680 Jon Stewart's in it. He's a crossword fanatic, did you know. Yeah, 0:00:44.760 --> 0:00:48.320 a lot of people I know are crossword fanatics. Kim Jennings, 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:51.559 of course, as you would imagine, is quite good at 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:53.760 the New York Times Crossword A little on the nose 0:00:53.800 --> 0:00:56.400 if you ask me, Yeah, what is that guy not 0:00:56.480 --> 0:01:00.760 good at? Right? Um, podcasting, he's good at that. He's 0:01:00.800 --> 0:01:04.360 good at everything, good at talking to strangers the time 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:08.920 that I met him. Sure. Anyway, So one of the 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:12.000 people who's in that documentary Chuck is Will Shorts, and 0:01:12.000 --> 0:01:14.440 Will Shorts has kind of become a legendary figure in 0:01:14.480 --> 0:01:18.080 the crossword community and even beyond, frankly, because he is 0:01:18.120 --> 0:01:23.240 just a straight up, interesting, neat kind of Um. I 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:25.720 want to say comforting, and it doesn't feel like the 0:01:25.840 --> 0:01:29.000 right word, And when I'm describing a crossroad puzzle editor, 0:01:29.040 --> 0:01:31.200 I feel like I should have exactly the right word, 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:34.560 but comforting still works. He's just a cool dude. But 0:01:34.680 --> 0:01:37.440 he is the current editor of the New York Times 0:01:37.440 --> 0:01:40.680 crossword Puzzle, and he has basically taken it and catapulted 0:01:40.720 --> 0:01:46.399 it into international fame. It's like the crossword Puzzle thanks 0:01:46.440 --> 0:01:50.280 in large part to his efforts. Yeah, if you want 0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:53.240 to go back in time, though, it's pretty interesting in 0:01:53.280 --> 0:01:57.600 that The New York Times was the very last major 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:01.520 daily metropolitan newspay for in the United States to start 0:02:01.520 --> 0:02:06.120 a crossword puzzle. They were really popular all over the country, uh, 0:02:06.400 --> 0:02:09.960 starting in about nine and The New York Times even 0:02:10.000 --> 0:02:13.079 came out and was like, you know what, here's a 0:02:13.120 --> 0:02:16.320 quote for you, the latest of the problems presented for 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:21.080 solution by psychologists interested in the mental peculiarities of mobs 0:02:21.080 --> 0:02:23.480 and crowds. That's what a crossword is going to do 0:02:23.520 --> 0:02:27.440 for you? No idea what they meant by that one. Well, 0:02:27.440 --> 0:02:31.959 they were just saying it's sort of base, uh, entertainment 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:34.840 and knowledge. I think I'm gonna have to go back 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:37.079 and reread it. That's fine, but I'll take it. I'll 0:02:37.120 --> 0:02:39.240 take it on space. You know what I'm reminded of 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:41.960 now when I think of crossroad puzzles as Rupert Sheldrake's 0:02:42.040 --> 0:02:44.959 theory that crossroad puzzles get easier to solve as the 0:02:45.040 --> 0:02:49.519 day goes on because of everybody's collective consciousness. Yeah, I'm 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:52.520 sure that's the case. So it is pretty surprising that 0:02:52.560 --> 0:02:56.919 The New York Times pooh pooed crosswords as fooi for 0:02:57.720 --> 0:03:03.240 twenty years easily by almost twenty years, um, maybe fifteen, 0:03:03.680 --> 0:03:07.040 So that crossword craze starts in the New York Times 0:03:07.080 --> 0:03:11.160 didn't finally published one until the beginning of World War One. No, 0:03:11.240 --> 0:03:13.680 I think it was probably World War two. What did 0:03:13.680 --> 0:03:17.240 I say? He said? World War one? Yeah, so the 0:03:17.240 --> 0:03:20.360 New York Times went back in time to beat everybody. 0:03:20.440 --> 0:03:22.400 So sorry, it was World War two when they adopted it. 0:03:22.440 --> 0:03:25.440 So about fifteen years after the craze started, they held 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:29.239 out and then finally, as the legend goes, the Times 0:03:29.320 --> 0:03:34.440 editor Arthur Sulzberger. Um. He he was tired of buying 0:03:34.440 --> 0:03:37.560 the New York Herald or note the Harold Tribune so 0:03:37.640 --> 0:03:40.080 that he could play their crossrood puzzle or do their 0:03:40.120 --> 0:03:42.360 crossrood puzzle. He wanted the Times to have its own, 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:46.440 and he finally said, fine, we'll publish a cross world Yeah. 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:48.720 I get the feeling. His name, his nickname was selzie 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:54.200 m h. Yeah, Arthur Salzi Sulzberger. Yeah, it's the beginning 0:03:54.200 --> 0:03:58.360 of World War two. And basically the thought was, besides 0:03:58.400 --> 0:04:00.960 the fact that he wanted one, is that you know, 0:04:01.000 --> 0:04:03.720 all we're doing is talking about World War two. Maybe 0:04:03.760 --> 0:04:05.840 a crossword puzzle is finally a good idea to kind 0:04:05.840 --> 0:04:09.400 of get people's mind off of things. So you over there, 0:04:09.560 --> 0:04:12.880 miss Margaret Ferrar, why don't you be our very first 0:04:12.880 --> 0:04:16.920 crossword editor. Uh, because you have been editing all these books, 0:04:17.480 --> 0:04:19.800 crossword books that Simon and Schuster has been putting out 0:04:19.800 --> 0:04:24.479 since right, and to get everybody's minds off of it. 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:27.840 By the way, make sure that the crossword puzzle answers 0:04:27.880 --> 0:04:29.920 and clues have to do with the news that are 0:04:29.960 --> 0:04:33.480 in that day's newspaper, which all happened to be about 0:04:33.560 --> 0:04:36.560 the war and the lead up to war. And so 0:04:36.720 --> 0:04:39.279 Ferrar was like, all right, you know what, I'm a 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:43.160 crossword legend already. I'm going to I'm gonna make this 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:46.239 one right. And she really did. She had like really 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:51.480 really great crosswords that she edited. Um and she pushed 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:55.279 back I think fairly quickly on that idea that it 0:04:55.440 --> 0:04:58.279 needed to reflect the day's news and said, you know what, 0:04:58.520 --> 0:05:00.359 I think it needs to do the opposite that I 0:05:00.400 --> 0:05:04.800 think we need to um get references from literature, from 0:05:05.080 --> 0:05:09.279 popular culture, from um, just about everything but the day's 0:05:09.360 --> 0:05:12.320 news so that people can use the crossword as an escape, 0:05:12.600 --> 0:05:15.279 and managed to establish the New York Times crossword is 0:05:15.279 --> 0:05:19.680 basically the preeminent crossword in the world. Yeah, and she did. Uh. 0:05:19.800 --> 0:05:21.920 She did this for twenty seven years, from forty two 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:26.400 to sixty nine, which is a very long run, that's right. 0:05:26.520 --> 0:05:28.359 And it was a big, big hit, like he said. 0:05:28.920 --> 0:05:33.040 And then in nineteen sixty nine Mr will wang Uh 0:05:33.120 --> 0:05:37.000 succeeded her, and he I think was the head at 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:39.800 the Metropolitan desk at the Times. Then he took over 0:05:39.839 --> 0:05:42.599 as crossword editor. He was a little bit more of 0:05:42.680 --> 0:05:46.000 a of an old fashioned newsy type, but he did 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:49.320 love crosswords and he had been writing these crosswords for 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:51.799 a long time for the Times, and they finally said, 0:05:52.200 --> 0:05:54.280 bring your great sets of humor over here and become 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:58.080 the editor. Yeah he was apparently, like the Times, crosswords 0:05:58.080 --> 0:06:01.960 were never funnier than when will Wang was editor. Lots 0:06:01.960 --> 0:06:05.560 of pants dropping jokes, just super seventies stuff. You know, 0:06:06.040 --> 0:06:11.200 Ziggy made an appearance almost every day, and nothing's funnier 0:06:11.240 --> 0:06:17.039 than Ziggy. Right, So, um, Will Wang kind of had this, 0:06:17.240 --> 0:06:20.120 uh the paper under or the crossword under his wing 0:06:20.200 --> 0:06:25.720 for seven years, I think under Yeah, yeah, I didn't 0:06:25.720 --> 0:06:28.120 even mean to do that. That's a great example. So 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:31.440 seven eight years he was the editor of the cross Word. Um, 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:33.720 and then he was succeeded by a guy named Eugene 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:37.360 Ti Moleska. And if there's ever been a crossword editor 0:06:37.360 --> 0:06:40.920 who deserved a cliffhanger more than Eugene tie Moleska, I've 0:06:40.960 --> 0:07:17.600 never met one. We'll be right back alright, Chuck. So 0:07:17.640 --> 0:07:20.520 how does it? How does it end with Eugene tie Meleska. 0:07:21.000 --> 0:07:24.920 So Gene Moleska is running the show now, and the 0:07:24.920 --> 0:07:27.800 puzzles become a little more varied a little more sophisticated 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:31.800 uh more word play, but not as much of a 0:07:31.840 --> 0:07:34.520 sense of humor. I get the sense from when Wang 0:07:34.640 --> 0:07:39.720 was doing it. He was a school superintendent in the Bronx. No, 0:07:39.960 --> 0:07:43.400 he was an opera classical music and it was just 0:07:43.480 --> 0:07:46.240 a little more serious in tone than Wangs were. Yeah, 0:07:46.320 --> 0:07:47.880 I mean all you have to do is say opera 0:07:47.920 --> 0:07:52.040 and classical music enthusiast editing a crossword puzzle, and that's 0:07:52.320 --> 0:07:57.080 you know, polar opposite of of Wang. Yeah. So Eugeneie 0:07:57.120 --> 0:07:59.520 Moleski does a fine job. He did it for many 0:07:59.560 --> 0:08:02.280 many years, from um, nineteen seventy seven until I think 0:08:02.320 --> 0:08:07.920 ninetee and um uh then Will Shortz comes along. And 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:11.360 from everything I can tell after reading this and seeing 0:08:11.440 --> 0:08:15.920 Will Shorts in that documentary word play, he's a like 0:08:15.960 --> 0:08:20.400 a perfect combination of every previous New York Times crossword 0:08:20.480 --> 0:08:23.120 editor that came before him, Like he's all of them 0:08:23.160 --> 0:08:26.400 rolled into one. He's, you know, very sophisticated. Um, he 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:29.360 has a lot of culture like Moleska. He's got a 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:33.000 sense of humor like Wang. He's um really into crosswords 0:08:33.000 --> 0:08:35.640 and knows how to make him great. Like Ferrar, He's 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:39.360 he's just like the the whole package. Like I I 0:08:39.400 --> 0:08:42.280 didn't realize it until this moment. I'm a Will Shorts fan. 0:08:42.480 --> 0:08:45.880 I don't even do crosswords all that often. Yeah. The 0:08:45.920 --> 0:08:48.320 big thing that Shorts did, uh, and then he has 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:51.520 kind of become known for is is modernizing it some 0:08:51.640 --> 0:08:55.160 and bringing a more youthful tone to it. It was 0:08:55.280 --> 0:08:57.240 kind of seen as like an old person's thing to 0:08:57.240 --> 0:08:58.959 sit around and do the cross words. Well that was 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:03.319 in large part thing to Molaska, oh for sure. So uh, 0:09:03.600 --> 0:09:05.640 Shorts comes along and he's like, you know what I'm 0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:07.720 gonna do? And this is something I didn't even know. 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:10.360 I didn't know that regular people just write these things 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:13.520 out and submit them, which is an amazing fact. If 0:09:13.520 --> 0:09:15.880 you did not know that, I knew that. I knew that. 0:09:15.960 --> 0:09:18.599 Do you know why? Because a stuff you should know, 0:09:18.640 --> 0:09:22.800 a listener does words searches and they submit them. Remember 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:24.440 that they did a stuff you should know word search 0:09:24.480 --> 0:09:28.200 and I think it was in USA today. Oh cool. Yeah, Well, 0:09:28.280 --> 0:09:30.439 Shorts came along and said, we need a younger voice 0:09:30.440 --> 0:09:35.200 in here, and so uh, I think only six teenagers 0:09:35.360 --> 0:09:39.200 previous to Shorts had ever gotten puzzles published. In his 0:09:39.280 --> 0:09:42.760 twenty five years. He has published thirty seventeen agers and 0:09:42.880 --> 0:09:47.520 the average age has gone Uh, I think down and 0:09:47.760 --> 0:09:49.600 you know, of course he still has the oldest person 0:09:50.160 --> 0:09:52.559 a hundred and one years old, but the the average 0:09:52.559 --> 0:09:55.679 age of contributor has now come down to UM has 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:58.680 come down fifteen years from the early fifties to about 0:09:58.679 --> 0:10:01.800 the thirties. Right, So that's I mean, that's that reflects 0:10:01.840 --> 0:10:04.240 an enormous change. Like the people who are creating these 0:10:04.240 --> 0:10:08.640 crossroom puzzles are the ones who, um, who actually map 0:10:08.679 --> 0:10:12.480 out the puzzle, figure out the answers, right, the clues 0:10:13.040 --> 0:10:15.400 and the choices they're going to make are going to 0:10:15.480 --> 0:10:17.959 reflect their age group a lot more so, just by 0:10:18.080 --> 0:10:21.360 virtue of selecting puzzles that are written by a slightly 0:10:21.440 --> 0:10:23.880 younger group of people, they're going to be a lot 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:28.480 more modern and current and um more accessible to a 0:10:28.559 --> 0:10:32.280 larger group of people. Yeah. So they get about seventy 0:10:32.840 --> 0:10:35.920 hundred submissions a week. Uh. If you're building your own 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:40.320 crossword puzzle, you probably are not using graph paper like 0:10:40.320 --> 0:10:42.720 they used to do. You're probably using a computer program 0:10:42.720 --> 0:10:45.439 to help you out. I'll bet some hipsters who hire 0:10:45.559 --> 0:10:49.880 artism pencil sharpeners do graft papers still Yeah, they're getting 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:53.760 their pencils from David Reese. So this is pretty interesting 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:55.600 to me when you're making a puzzle, and I guess 0:10:55.600 --> 0:10:58.560 this kind of makes sense, um, kind of like there's 0:10:58.559 --> 0:11:01.000 one way to build a boat. You put your theme 0:11:01.160 --> 0:11:04.440 answers in the grid first, and then you put your 0:11:04.480 --> 0:11:06.960 little black squares and plot it out out and divide 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:10.559 it into your sections, and then you write the clues. Yeah, 0:11:10.679 --> 0:11:14.720 so you basically reverse engineer the puzzle, starting with the words, 0:11:14.840 --> 0:11:17.559 then the black spaces, then the clues. I had no idea. 0:11:18.720 --> 0:11:22.080 I've been doing it wrong. I start with the black spaces, 0:11:22.120 --> 0:11:24.560 then the clues, then the words. It rarely works out. 0:11:25.080 --> 0:11:29.400 Have you ever tried to write one? No? No, I know, 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:31.480 I really don't think so. You know that part of 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:34.839 your brain that inserts false memories when you want to 0:11:34.880 --> 0:11:38.319 answer yes to something, that that part of my brain 0:11:38.440 --> 0:11:41.319 like was just an operation. And I said, no, no, brain, 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:44.599 you're wrong. You've never tried to do a crosswords. You 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:48.000 never tried to make a crossword from scratch? Shut up. Yeah, 0:11:48.000 --> 0:11:50.200 I enjoy crosswords, but I don't seek them out. I'm 0:11:50.240 --> 0:11:52.880 not an enthusiast. Um. There was when I was in college. 0:11:52.880 --> 0:11:54.280 I would do the one from the Red and Black 0:11:54.320 --> 0:11:57.760 every day, and then when I fly on Delta, I 0:11:57.800 --> 0:11:59.920 will do the one in the Sky magazine if it's 0:12:00.160 --> 0:12:02.280 filled out. Yeah you mean. And I UM went on 0:12:02.320 --> 0:12:04.760 a little kick where we were doing crosswords, and we 0:12:04.800 --> 0:12:08.560 bought a Chicago Tribune book of crosswords. It was like 0:12:08.600 --> 0:12:11.320 pretty much up our alley. Supposedly the New York Times 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:14.599 is um. They they it is well known as a 0:12:14.720 --> 0:12:18.600 very difficult crossword, but that over the span of the 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:21.840 week it actually gets progressively harder, which I didn't know. 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.440 Did you know that? Yeah? I didn't know that. That's 0:12:24.440 --> 0:12:26.080 one of the few things I knew because I know 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:29.080 that the UM. I always thought the Sunday when was 0:12:29.200 --> 0:12:33.959 the kuda grab. Apparently the Saturday is the most difficult. 0:12:34.559 --> 0:12:37.800 The Sunday is larger, but it's more like a Wednesday 0:12:37.920 --> 0:12:40.439 or Thursday on the easy scale. So I guess that's 0:12:40.480 --> 0:12:43.240 what I thought was it was bigger, so it was harder, 0:12:43.360 --> 0:12:45.839 not that there was just more to it. But yeah, 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.760 the Saturday is the hardest and then Monday's the easiest. 0:12:49.559 --> 0:12:52.840 That's right. And now that they're online, of course, you 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:56.640 can subscribe only to the Times Crossword and they have 0:12:56.760 --> 0:12:59.120 close to a half a million people that subscribe just 0:12:59.200 --> 0:13:02.559 to the crossword and apparently it's a it's a pretty 0:13:02.600 --> 0:13:05.559 decent source of income for the paper sailing New York Times. 0:13:05.679 --> 0:13:08.640 Does people pay a million dollars a year for that subscription. 0:13:09.240 --> 0:13:12.360 It's amazing. It's a lot of dough way to go, 0:13:12.480 --> 0:13:15.520 will shorts way to Go. And by the way, if 0:13:15.520 --> 0:13:17.839 you're into crossword puzzles at all and you haven't seen 0:13:17.880 --> 0:13:21.240 Wordplay yet the documentary, go see it. Um And since 0:13:21.240 --> 0:13:27.200 I said that it's short stuff away Stuff you should 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:29.920 Know is a production of iHeart Radios How Stuff Works. 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:32.320 For more podcasts. For My Heart Radio, visit the iHeart 0:13:32.360 --> 0:13:35.040 Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:35.760 favorite shows.