| Merl Reagle | |
|---|---|
| Born | January 5, 1950 Audubon, New Jersey |
| Occupation | crossword constructor |
Merl Reagle (b. January 5, 1950, Audubon, New Jersey) is an American crossword constructor. Since 1985, he has constructed a puzzle every Sunday for the San Francisco Chronicle (originally the San Francisco Examiner); it is now also published by the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Seattle Times, The Plain Dealer (Cleveland, Ohio), the Hartford Courant, the New York Observer, and the Arizona Daily Star, among others.
Reagle made his first crossword when he was six and sold a puzzle to The New York Times at age 16, a feat that made him the youngest published Times puzzle constructor at the time.
Contents |
Will Shortz, the crossword puzzle editor for The New York Times, has said that "his themes are consistently fresher and funnier than anyone else's. And he's one of the greatest puzzlemakers at interlocking words in intricate, wide-open patterns."[1] Games magazine has called him "the best Sunday crossword creator in America,"[2] and a poll of puzzle makers at cruciverb.com[1], a popular web site for crossword constructors, ranked Reagle the most admired by his peers.[3] His 2004 puzzle, "Wide Open Spaces", holds the record for the lowest word count (i.e., number of answers) in a Sunday puzzle. The 21 x 21 grid has only 112 words (with 51 black squares).[2] The prolific crossword editor Stanley Newman called Reagle's puzzle "Gridlock"[3] "the best single crossword of the last 25 years."[4]
His fellow constructors routinely credit Reagle for creating some of the funniest themes for his puzzles. One, called "Hit Song", was what he called "Sean Penn's version of "My Way". It included the theme entries I'M IN A / RUSH, NO PICTURES, PLEASE, OR / ELSE YOU'LL LEARN THE / BLACKENED EYE WAY / THE RECORD SHOWS / I'LL BUST YOUR / NOSE IF YOU GET IN... / MY WAY.[5] Other much-discussed puzzles carried titles like "Inappropriate Muzak for a Doctor's Office" and "Least Popular Beanie Babies".
He is noted for making puzzles with pencil and paper, without the aid of a computer. The 2006 documentary Wordplay depicted Reagle's on-camera construction of a crossword that subsequently was published in The New York Times. The film then showed various famous crossword enthusiasts, including Bill Clinton, Jon Stewart, the Indigo Girls, and Mike Mussina, attempting to solve the puzzle. Reagle has often constructed puzzles for the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, which he first attended in 1979, its second year. He now serves as a tournament judge, and is a commentator for the tournament's finals.[4]
On November 16, 2008, Reagle's was a "special guest voice" on an episode of The Simpsons called "Homer and Lisa Exchange Cross Words." In the episode, which featured a New York Times crossword, a cartoon version of Reagle appeared together with Shortz, and Lisa Simpson discovered secret messages embedded in both the clues and the puzzle, which Reagle constructed and Shortz edited. The actual crossword appearing that same day in the Times had the embedded messages.
Reagle also has been featured on CNN, the Today show, Nightline, Oprah[5], and National Public Radio.[5] An article he wrote on crossword construction for the Philadelphia Inquirer in February 1997 was reproduced in shorter form in the July 1998 Reader's Digest.
One of the few crossword puzzle constructors who makes a full-time living at his craft, Reagle is the only U.S. Sunday crossword maker who does his own syndication. With the assistance of his wife, Marie Haley, he has published 16 volumes of his Sunday crosswords, which he sells from his website.
Merl and Marie make their home in the Tampa Bay, Florida area.