Tokyo Rose's real first name / SAT 5-11-13 / Act in Last Samurai / Fish that attaches itself to host / Pope who started First Crusade / Site of Three Gorges Dam / Part of coast of Brazil / Twin-engine Navy helicopter / Like King Sargon II Abbr / Bahrain bigwigs / Home of more than 900 volcanoes / Where guarani is cash

Constructor: Matt Ginsberg

Relative difficulty: Medium-Challenging


THEME: LOCATION (61A: Place)— Four different clues read [X, taking into account its 61-Across], where X is another clue in the grid

Theme answers:

• 56D: 1-Across, taking into account its 61-Across (A-ONE) — 1A: DRAWER is at the "Top" of the grid, thus, [Top drawer] => A-ONE
• 13D: 68-Across, taking into account its 61-Across (CARP) — 68A: FEEDER is at the "Bottom" of the grid, thus, [Bottom feeder] => CARP
• 25A: 33-Down, taking into account its 61-Across (SAILED) — 33D: PORT is on "Left" side of grid, thus, [Left port] => SAILED
• 49A: 32-Down, taking into account its 61-Across (AT ONCE) — 32D: AWAY is on the "Right" side of the grid, thus, [Right away] => AT ONCE

Word of the Day: IVIE Anderson (12D: Ellington band vocalist Anderson) —

Ivie Anderson (sometimes Ivy) (July 10, 1905 – December 28, 1949) was an Americanjazzsinger. She is best known for her performances with Duke Ellington's orchestra between 1931 and 1942. (wikipedia)

Theme is very nice. Clever, interesting, tough, and nicely executed (full symmetry!). Sadly, I failed to finish cleanly. I soldiered through the random letter land mine that was WOJTYLA (4D: John Paul II, originally), but got blown apart by the second of such mines, ENIWETOK (65A: 1950s H-bomb test site). Never heard of the latter, and there's not a single letter in that name that is inferrable. Not a one. So when I saw 57D: Univ. grouping, and I had SC-S, I went with SCHS. My univ., for instance, has a SCHool of Nursing, a SCHool of Management, SCHool of Engineering, etc. And ENHWETOK, while indeed absurd-looking, is really not much more absurd-looking than ENIWETOK (which, by the way, can also be spelled ENEWETOK). Maybe knowing ENIWETOK is a generational thing, because this is the first I'm hearing of it. Bikini Atoll, I've heard of. ENIWETOK. No, NOTOK. Otherwise, smooth, steady, entertaining sailing.


NE and SW corners bogged me down worse than other places in the grid. Not knowing BAHIA (which I've heard of, but ...) (7D: Part of the coast of Brazil) or IVIE or SCR (ouch) meant that I had to work a bit to get in there. And, yeah, ENIWETOK we know about. I also had SURF for 55D: Coast (SLED), in a way. Had PATINA at first at 26D: Veneer, e.g. (LAMINA), which must've been a fairly common initial mistake today. I also thought King Sargon II was ARYAN, but then retracted that when I realized ARYAN is not an "Abbr." ASSYR is one of a handful of terrible answers today (see also AMIRS), but the good news is that said answers are relatively few, mostly spaced out, and overshadowed by a nice core concept. Glad "guarani" was in the clue and not the answer. At least I could infer PARAGUAY (33A: Where the guarani is cash). Tokyo Rose's real first name is IVA? OK. Only IVA I know is in The Maltese Falcon. In addition to a non-Maltese Falcon clue for IVA, I got a non-Seattle football clue for SEAHAWK (43D: Twin-engine Navy helicopter). Interesting. Was hard for me to get to ANDES because of the word "Home" in 51A: Home of more than 900 volcanoes. Word connotes country or continent to me, though I don't know why that should be so. Also, the ANDES are so damned long that it's hard for me to think of it as a single "Home." But Chile's long, and I probably would've accepted Chile as "Home." Possibly because you can be a legal resident / citizen of Chile. Not the ANDES. But I (really) digress.

Signed, Rex Parker, King of CrossWorld