Master the NYT crossword from January 08, 1990 with our expert hint system. We provide synonyms, antonyms, and strategic clues to help you solve without spoiling the fun.
Puzzle Difficulty: Tricky
Pro Tip: Start with the fill-in-the-blank clues - they're usually the easiest entry points!
Across Clues - Strategic Hints (38 clues)
1A: "1. Actress Prentiss"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PAULA
2A: "6. Hemingway's sobriquet"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that an informal term for a father; probably derived from baby talk
- Similar words include: pappa, pop, dad
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PAPA
3A: "10. G-men"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that any federal law-enforcement officer
- Similar words include: Federal Reserve, Fed, FRS
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: FEDS
4A: "14. Hair styles"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a rounded thickly curled hairdo
- Similar words include: Afro, Afro hairdo
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AFROS
5A: "15. Novelist Kingsley ___"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AMIS
6A: "16. Soviet stream"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: URAL
7A: "17. Sitcom add-on"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: __________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: LAUGHTRACK
8A: "19. Supreme Court number"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the cardinal number that is the sum of eight and one
- Similar words include: 9, Nina from Carolina, ball club
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: NINE
9A: "20. Gaelic"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that any of several related languages of the celts in ireland and scotland
- Similar words include: Goidelic, Gaelic
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ERSE
10A: "21. Speed"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that overly eager speed (and possible carelessness)
- Similar words include: rush, hurriedness, hurry
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: HASTE
11A: "22. Want"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a condition requiring relief
- Similar words include: involve, motive, take
- Opposite of: obviate
Click to reveal answer
Answer: NEED
12A: "23. Things with springs"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a piece of furniture that provides a place to sleep
- Similar words include: love, hump, know
- Opposite of: get up, turn out
Click to reveal answer
Answer: BEDS
13A: "24. Route"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that how something is done or how it happens
- Similar words include: room, elbow room, path
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: WAY
14A: "26. Enchantress"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that (greek mythology) a sorceress who detained odysseus on her island and turned his men into swine
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: CIRCE
15A: "30. Slippery one"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the fatty flesh of eel; an elongate fish found in fresh water in europe and america; large eels are usually smoked or pickled
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: EEL
16A: "32. Metal beam"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: IBAR
17A: "35. Negatively charged atoms"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a negatively charged ion
- Similar words include: anion
- Pattern: ______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ANIONS
18A: "37. Ambassador or envoy"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that an official engaged in international negotiations
- Similar words include: diplomatist
- Pattern: ________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: DIPLOMAT
19A: "40. Letters to stars"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: _______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: FANMAIL
20A: "42. 'Twixt 12 and 20"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that being of the age 13 through 19
- Similar words include: teenaged, adolescent, teen
- Pattern: _______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: TEENAGE
21A: "43. Surrounded"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ENGIRDED
22A: "45. Surpassing: Comb. form"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PRETER
23A: "46. Suffix with inchoative verbs"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ESCE
24A: "47. Period"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a period marked by distinctive character or reckoned from a fixed point or event
- Similar words include: geological era, epoch, earned run average
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ERA
25A: "49. Willow"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that flexible twig of a willow tree
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: OSIER
26A: "50. Soviet div."
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: SSR
27A: "52. Press"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a heavy ductile magnetic metallic element; is silver-white in pure form but readily rusts; used in construction and tools and armament; plays a role in the transport of oxygen by the blood
- Similar words include: branding iron, Fe, atomic number 26
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: IRON
28A: "54. Tear"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a payment or series of payments made by the lessee to an owner for use of some property, facility, equipment, or service
- Similar words include: charter, pull, engage
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: RENT
29A: "57. Golfer Palmer"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ARNIE
30A: "59. In the center"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AMID
31A: "63. Jewish month"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the sixth month of the civil year; the twelfth month of the ecclesiastic year in the jewish calendar (in february and march)
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ADAR
32A: "64. Card-game phrase"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: __________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: JOKERSWILD
33A: "66. "La Bohème" heroine"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: MIMI
34A: "67. First victim"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that norwegian mathematician (1802-1829)
- Similar words include: Niels Henrik Abel, Niels Abel
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ABEL
35A: "68. Dance of Bohemian origin"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that music performed for dancing the polka
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: POLKA
36A: "69. Kind of mother or son"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that any maneuver made as part of progress toward a goal
- Similar words include: ill-use, stride, footfall
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: STEP
37A: "70. Word on a towel"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: HERS
38A: "71. Appease"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that lessen the intensity of or calm
- Similar words include: slake, still, ease
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ALLAY
Down Clues - Strategic Hints (40 clues)
1D: "1. Wan"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a wooden strip forming part of a fence
- Similar words include: pallid, sick, blanch
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PALE
2D: "2. Way off"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that (old-fashioned) at or from or to a great distance; far
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AFAR
3D: "3. Wild ox"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that large recently extinct long-horned european wild ox; considered one of the ancestors of domestic cattle
- Similar words include: Bos primigenius, aurochs
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: URUS
4D: "4. Theater section"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that balcony consisting of the forward section of a theater mezzanine
- Similar words include: box
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: LOGE
5D: "5. Wood for skis"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the residue that remains when something is burned
- Similar words include: ash tree
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ASH
6D: "6. "I Love a ___," 1931 song"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a ceremonial procession including people marching
- Similar words include: march, troop, exhibit
- Pattern: ______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PARADE
7D: "7. Gathered"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that collect or gather
- Similar words include: hoard, amass, cumulate
- Pattern: _______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AMASSED
8D: "8. Early inhabitant of Britain"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PICT
9D: "9. Awry"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that turned or twisted toward one side; - g.k.chesterton
- Similar words include: lopsided, skew-whiff, wonky
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ASKEW
10D: "10. These often get tickled"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: __________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: FUNNYBONES
11D: "11. City in the Keystone State"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a member of an iroquoian people formerly living on the south shore of lake erie in northern ohio and northwest pennsylvania and western new york
- Similar words include: Lake Erie
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ERIE
12D: "12. Hamlet, e.g."
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a native or inhabitant of denmark
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: DANE
13D: "13. Snow vehicle"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a vehicle mounted on runners and pulled by horses or dogs; for transportation over snow
- Similar words include: sledge, sleigh
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: SLED
14D: "18. "___ Best of Carson""
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: THE
15D: "23. Former name of Varanasi, India"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: _______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: BENARES
16D: "25. Wing part"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that an airfoil that controls lateral motion
- Pattern: _______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AILERON
17D: "26. Bistro"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a small restaurant where drinks and snacks are sold
- Similar words include: coffee shop, coffeehouse, coffee bar
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: CAFE
18D: "27. Silly"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that devoid of intelligence
- Similar words include: mindless, vacuous, fatuous
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: INANE
19D: "28. Collar woes?"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that gymnastic apparatus consisting of a pair of heavy metal circles (usually covered with leather) suspended by ropes; used for gymnastic exercises
- Similar words include: pack, annulus, telephone
- Opposite of: open chain
Click to reveal answer
Answer: RINGS
20D: "29. "Peanuts," e.g."
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: __________
Click to reveal answer
Answer: COMICSTRIP
21D: "31. Kindled"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the humanistic study of a body of literature
- Similar words include: lighted, dismount, light up
- Opposite of: unlighted, extinguish
Click to reveal answer
Answer: LIT
22D: "33. Strad competitor"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that italian violin maker in cremona; taught the craft to guarneri and stradivari (1596-1684)
- Similar words include: Nicola Amati, Nicolo Amati
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AMATI
23D: "34. E. Indian cereal grass"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that east indian cereal grass whose seed yield a somewhat bitter flour, a staple in the orient
- Similar words include: finger millet, Eleusine coracana, coracan
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: RAGEE
24D: "36. Caesar from Yonkers"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: SID
25D: "38. Vim"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that liveliness and energy
- Similar words include: peppiness, ginger
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: PEP
26D: "39. Haw. before 1959"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: TERR
27D: "41. Novelist Harper ___"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that united states filmmaker whose works explore the richness of black culture in america (born in 1957)
- Similar words include: Tsung Dao Lee, Shelton Jackson Lee, Lighthorse Harry Lee
- Opposite of: windward
Click to reveal answer
Answer: LEE
28D: "44. A.A. candidate"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a person who drinks liquids
- Similar words include: toper, juicer, imbiber
- Opposite of: nondrinker
Click to reveal answer
Answer: DRINKER
29D: "48. Gazelles of Arabia"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ______
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ARIELS
30D: "51. Rani's spouse"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a prince or king in india
- Similar words include: raja
- Pattern: _____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: RAJAH
31D: "53. Finished, to Keats"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: OER
32D: "54. Bellwethers"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that the most common computer memory which can be used by programs to perform necessary tasks while the computer is on; an integrated circuit memory chip allows information to be stored or accessed in any order and all storage locations are equally accessible
- Similar words include: cram, pound, RAM
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: RAMS
33D: "55. Redact"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that prepare for publication or presentation by correcting, revising, or adapting
- Similar words include: edit out, redact, cut
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: EDIT
34D: "56. Appoint"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a language unit by which a person or thing is known
- Similar words include: list, key, describe
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: NAME
35D: "58. Gown"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that any loose flowing garment
- Similar words include: vest, gown, cloak
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ROBE
36D: "59. G.I. truant"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that one who is away or absent without leave
- Similar words include: truant
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: AWOL
37D: "60. Factory"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a plant consisting of one or more buildings with facilities for manufacturing
- Similar words include: mill about, factory, grinder
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: MILL
38D: "61. Actress-writer Chase"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: ILKA
39D: "62. June 6, 1944"
Solving Hints:
- Pattern: ____
Click to reveal answer
Answer: DDAY
40D: "65. Baden-Baden is one"
Solving Hints:
- Think of something that a health resort near a spring or at the seaside
- Similar words include: health club, resort hotel, health spa
- Pattern: ___
Click to reveal answer
Answer: SPA
Puzzle Stats
38 Across
40 Down
78 Total