WAMC's Ian Pickus and resident quizzer Mike Nothnagel mark the summer solstice in style.Last week's challenge
Start with the words OREGON and MAINE. Drop one letter and you can rearrange the result to spell a two-word phrase (six letters, four letters) that names an area on a ship that has lots of machines. What is the phrase?
Answer: If you drop the A, you can spell ENGINE ROOM.
THIS WEEK'S CATEGORY: “S”UMMER “S”OLSTICE
On-air questions: Well, Mike, if you’re getting ready for the sunset tonight, you still have a couple hours to go. Today is the longest day of the year – the summer solstice. That means today is the official first day of summer. Officially, the solstice happened at 11:54 a.m. eastern time today. In honor of the summer solstice, all of today’s correct answers will have the initials S.S.
1. In 1998, Ken Griffey Jr. finished third with 56 home runs for the Mariners. First was the Cardinals’ Mark McGwire with 70. Who finished between them with 66 for the Chicago Cubs?
2. Although he published crosswords in the early days of New York magazine in the late 1960s, whose career also includes eight Tony Awards, the 1985 Pulitzer Prize in Drama, an Academy Award for Best Song, and several Grammy Awards including Song of the Year for 1975’s “Send in the Clowns?”
3. Now an affluent Maryland community of about 80,000, what community got its name from a “mica-flecked” body of water near Washington, D.C. discovered by Francis Preston Blair and his daughter in 1840?
4. Located 149 miles from Guatemala City, 204 miles from Tegucigalpa and 313 miles from Managua, what is the only world capital that fits the category?
5. Among the original members of the short-lived but influential band Buffalo Springfield are Richie Furay, Neil Young, Dewey Martin, Bruce Palmer and what musician born in Dallas in 1945?
Extra credit
1. Also a playwright whose work includes “True West” and “Fool for Love,” what actor was nominated for the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his performance as Chuck Yeager in “The Right Stuff?”
2. What is the name of the rapper best remembered today for a 1992 “moment” that now refers to a politician repudiating an extremist otherwise thought to be a political ally?
This week's challenge
Start with the phrase SUMMER SOLSTICE. Rearrange the letters and you can spell a certain nine-letter group of people, and a five-letter word that often welcomes those people. What are the words?
ANSWERS
On-air questions
1. Sammy Sosa (Sosa finished his 18-year career with 606 home runs, including three seasons with at least 63)
2. Stephen Sondheim
3. Silver Spring (In a way, the Blair family looms large in American history: Montgomery Blair served in Lincoln’s cabinet, and Elizabeth Blair’s son Francis Preston Blair Lee, distantly related to Robert E. Lee, was the first popularly elected U.S. Senator)
4. San Salvador
5. Stephen Stills (fitting the category, Stills played on the 1968 album “Super Session” with fellow guitarist Mike Bloomfield)
Extra credit
1. Sam Shephard (Shephard died in 2017)
2. Sister Souljah
