Frank Longo is an American puzzle creator and author of more than 90 books, [1] which have sold more than 2 million copies. [2]
Longo is known for creating unusual crosswords, such as one on a 50x50 grid, [3] [4] the Jumbo Puzzles compilation of 29x29 puzzles [5] and is the creator and author of The New York Times Spelling Bee anagram puzzle. [6]
Longo is noted as an influence by several puzzle creators, including Brendan Emmett Quigley [7] and Joanne Sullivan. [8]
Norman Colin Dexter was an English crime writer known for his Inspector Morse series of novels, which were written between 1975 and 1999 and adapted as an ITV television series, Inspector Morse, from 1987 to 2000. His characters have spawned a sequel series, Lewis, from 2006 to 2015, and a prequel series, Endeavour, from 2012 to 2023.
Word games are spoken, board, card or video games often designed to test ability with language or to explore its properties.
A crossword is a word game consisting of a grid of black and white squares, into which solvers enter words or phrases ("entries") crossing each other horizontally ("across") and vertically ("down") according to a set of clues. Each white square is typically filled with one letter, while the black squares are used to separate entries. The first white square in each entry is typically numbered to correspond to its clue.
A cryptic crossword is a crossword puzzle in which each clue is a word puzzle. Cryptic crosswords are particularly popular in the United Kingdom, where they originated, as well as Ireland, the Netherlands, and in several Commonwealth nations, including Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malta, New Zealand, and South Africa. Compilers of cryptic crosswords are commonly called setters in the UK and constructors in the US. Particularly in the UK, a distinction may be made between cryptics and quick crosswords, and sometimes two sets of clues are given for a single puzzle grid.
William F. Shortz is an American puzzle creator and editor who is the crossword editor for The New York Times. He graduated from Indiana University with a degree in the invented field of enigmatology. After starting his career at Penny Press and Games magazine, he was hired by The New York Times in 1993. Shortz's American Crossword Puzzle Tournament is the country's oldest and largest crossword tournament.
The New York Times Magazine is an American Sunday magazine included with the Sunday edition of The New York Times. It features articles longer than those typically in the newspaper and has attracted many notable contributors. The magazine is noted for its photography, especially relating to fashion and style.
St. Martin's Press is a book publisher headquartered in Manhattan in New York City. It is headquartered in the Equitable Building. St. Martin's Press is considered one of the largest English-language publishers, bringing to the public some 700 titles a year under six imprints.
Timothy Eric Parker is an American puzzle editor, games creator, author, and TV producer.
The New York Times crossword is a daily American-style crossword puzzle published in The New York Times, syndicated to more than 300 other newspapers and journals, and released online on the newspaper's website and mobile apps as part of The New York Times Games.
Spellbound! is an educational computer game made and distributed by The Learning Company aimed at teaching spelling, vocabulary, and language development to children ages 7 to 12 years. The objective of the game is to play spelling-related games to qualify and compete for successively higher bracket spelling bees, concluding with the player competing in the national spelling bee. The original game, released in 1991, was compatible with computers running DOS 3.3 or higher. A 1993 CD release added spoken dialogue and was compatible with Windows 95 and Mac.
Margaret Petherbridge Farrar was an American journalist and the first crossword puzzle editor for The New York Times (1942–1968). Creator of many of the rules of modern crossword design, she compiled and edited a long-running series of crossword puzzle books – including the first book of any kind that Simon & Schuster published (1924). She was described the Los Angeles Times as "the grand dame of the American crossword puzzle."
Merl Harry Reagle was an American crossword constructor. For 30 years, he constructed a puzzle every Sunday for the San Francisco Chronicle, which he syndicated to more than 50 Sunday newspapers, including the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Seattle Times, The Plain Dealer, the Hartford Courant, the New York Observer, and the Arizona Daily Star. Reagle also produced crossword puzzles for AARP: The Magazine and the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament.
Norman "Trip" Payne is an American professional puzzle maker. He is known by many as a three-time champion of the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament (ACPT). With his first victory in 1993, at age 24, Payne became the youngest champion ever in the tournament's history, a record he held until 2005.
Brendan Emmett Quigley is an American crossword constructor. He has been described as a "crossword wunderkind". His work has been published in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe, by the Los Angeles Times Syndicate, and The Onion. He appeared in the documentary Wordplay and the book Crossworld: One Man's Journey into America's Crossword Obsession.
Matt Gaffney is a professional crossword puzzle constructor and author who lives in Staunton, Virginia. His puzzles have appeared in Billboard magazine, the Chicago Tribune, the Daily Beast, Dell Champion Crossword Puzzles, GAMES magazine, the Los Angeles Times, New York magazine, the New York Times, Newsday, The Onion, Slate magazine, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, Washingtonian Magazine, The Week, and Wine Spectator.
The New York TimesSpelling Bee, or simply the Spelling Bee, is a word game distributed in print and electronic format by The New York Times as part of The New York Times Games. Created by Frank Longo, the game debuted in a weekly print format in 2014. A digital daily version with an altered scoring system launched on May 9, 2018.
Daniel Larsen is an American mathematician known for proving a 1994 conjecture of W. R. Alford, Andrew Granville and Carl Pomerance on the distribution of Carmichael numbers, commonly known as Bertrand's postulate for Carmichael numbers.
Jon Agee is a children's book writer and illustrator whose work centers around wordplay. Since 1981, he has published more than 31 books.
The New York Times Games is a collection of casual print and online games published by The New York Times, an American newspaper. Originating with the newspaper's crossword puzzle in 1942, NYT Games was officially established on August 21, 2014, with the addition of the Mini Crossword. Most puzzles of The New York Times Games are published and refreshed daily, mirroring The Times' daily newspaper cadence.
Sam Ezersky is an American puzzle editor and crossword constructor who is the editor of The New York Times Spelling Bee. He has worked for the New York Times games department since 2017.