Tag Archives: Raymond Smullyan

PuzzleNation Blog Looks Back on 2017!

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2017 is quickly coming to a close, and as I look back on an eventful year in the world of puzzles and games, I’m incredibly proud of the contributions both PuzzleNation Blog and PuzzleNation made to the puzzle community as a whole.

Over the last year, we explored board games and card games, strategy games and trivia games, dice games and tile games, do-it-yourself puzzlers and pen-and-paper classics. We met game designers, constructors, artists, and creative types of all kinds.

We unraveled math puzzles and tackled the Crossword from Hell. We accepted the challenge of diabolical brain teasers, optical illusions, Internet memes, and more, even pondering our place in the world of puzzles as electronic solvers like Dr. Fill and AlphaGo rise in capability.

We delved into puzzle history with posts about the legacy of female codebreakers in World War II, game dice from centuries ago, theories about Shakespeare’s secret codes, and the long history of cryptography and the NSA. We brought to light valuable examples of puzzles in art, popular culture, famous quotations, and even the natural world as we pondered whether bees are verifiable problem-solvers like crows and octopuses.

We spread the word about numerous worthwhile Kickstarters and Indiegogo campaigns, watching as the puzzle/game renaissance continued to amaze and surprise us with innovative new ways to play and solve. We shared worthy causes like Puzzles for Progress, as well as amazing projects like new escape rooms, dazzling corn mazes, and the ongoing Kubrick’s Game interactive experience.

We cheered the 75th anniversary of the New York Times Crossword, and chronicled the many celebrations that marked the occasion, from guest crossword constructors like Bill Clinton and Lisa Loeb to a puzzle-centric cruise across the Atlantic!

We also mourned as friends and fellow puzzlers passed on. We said goodbye to David Lindsey and Raymond Smullyan, two underappreciated giants of the field. The pun-fueled show @midnight this year, which inspired our monthly hashtag game, also closed up shop, sadly.

We celebrated International TableTop Day, made puzzly bouquets in honor of International Puzzle Day, marveled at the records broken at the Rubik’s Cube World Championship, attended the American Crossword Puzzle Tournament and New York Toy Fair, and dove deep into an ever-expanding litany of puzzle events like the Indie 500, BosWords, Lollapuzzoola 10, and Crosswords LA.

We found puzzly ways to celebrate everything from Pi Day, the Super Bowl, and Star Wars Day to Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas, and we were happy to share so many remarkable puzzly landmark moments with you. We even discovered Puzzle Mountain!

It’s been both a pleasure and a privilege to explore the world of puzzles and games with you, my fellow puzzle lovers and PuzzleNationers. We marked five years of PuzzleNation Blog this year, I recently penned my 800th blog post, and I’m more excited to write for you now than I was when I started.

And honestly, that’s just the blog. PuzzleNation’s good fortune, hard work, and accomplishments in 2017 went well beyond that.

Every month, we delivered quality content for the Penny Dell Crosswords App. From monthly deluxe sets and bonus boxes to Dell Collection sets and holiday bundles, dozens upon dozens of topnotch puzzles wended their way to our loyal and enthusiastic solvers.

And just last month, we launched our newest puzzly endeavor — Daily POP Crosswords — bringing you fresh, up-to-date cluing and relatable themes in world-class puzzles created by some of the industry’s best constructors! (Many of whom you’ve gotten to know in our recent interview series, Meet the Daily POP Crosswords Constructors!)

But whether we’re talking about the Penny Dell Crosswords App or Daily POP Crosswords, I’m proud to say that every single puzzle represents our high standards of quality puzzle content crafted for solvers and PuzzleNationers.

And your response has been fantastic! Daily POP Crosswords is thriving, the blog has over 2200 followers, and with our audience on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and other platforms continuing to grow, the enthusiasm of the PuzzleNation readership is both humbling and very encouraging.

2017 was our most ambitious, most exciting, and most creatively fulfilling year to date, and the coming year promises to be even brighter.

Thank you for your support, your interest, and your feedback, PuzzleNationers. The new year looms large, and we look forward to seeing you in 2018!

Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

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Farewell, David.

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The puzzle world is a relatively small one, and sadly, over the last month or so, it has grown a bit smaller.

I know some of you are already aware of the passing of Raymond Smullyan, the mathematician and puzzlesmith who popularized, among other things, the logic puzzle known as “The Lady or the Tiger?”

What you may not know is that a long-time member of the Penny Dell Puzzles family also passed recently.

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A Yale-educated lawyer, David Lindsey was a fixture at Penny Press for decades, but his influence on the world of puzzles extends back years before he joined that company.

The earliest editing credit I’ve been able to track down is a 1967 edition of Webster’s Crosswords, published by Merit, which is also one of the few publications where I’ve seen him credited under his real name. So, if you’ve ever enjoyed a puzzle credited to Dee Stewart or George Spelvin (a famous pseudonym from the American theater), you have David to thank for it.

Penny Press president Peter Kanter associates David with puzzles as far back as the early 70s, though it’s unclear when exactly David began working for Penny Press on a part-time basis. (I suspect it would have been around the time the Merit brand was acquired by Penny Press.)

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He signed on full-time in 1987, and served as a puzzle editor, though perhaps his greatest legacy was the role he played in establishing its acquisitions department, the route by which outside puzzle creators and constructors could have their work featured in Penny Press magazines. David set quality standards for the puzzles that would be accepted, and served as the gatekeeper for all sorts of new puzzles.

He is also credited with creating or popularizing puzzles that are synonymous with Penny Dell Puzzles to this day. Secret Word, Chess Words, Chess Solitaire, Weaver Words, Diagramless Fill-In, Word Games Puzzles, and more flourished under his watchful eye and exacting attention to detail.

He would work the entire editing process, from concept to the final tweaks. At one point, David introduced a new type of puzzle in every issue of Variety Puzzles and Games, a Herculean feat.

His “Lindsey Lessons” — meetings where he would introduce and explain the nuances of puzzles — were invaluable to fellow editors, taking challenging puzzles like Word Math and making them more accessible, stripping away the mysteries that might have made them daunting to those who were unfamiliar with that sort of puzzling.

He even participated in a potluck-style puzzle group outside the office that would create and workshop new puzzle ideas together.

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[A photo from David’s 80th birthday celebration.]

But when I asked people about David, it wasn’t his work in puzzles that left a lasting influence on them. It was his strong sense of self, a quiet confidence that he was who he was, uncompromisingly. He was at home with his choices, his quirks, and his beliefs.

There were stories about the injured coyote he cared for, stories about him jogging shirtless in winter, and stories about the snacks he brought into the office, the fruits of his many experiments with the food dehydrator given to him by members of a cardiac rehab exercise class he conducted.

David said, “I never eat sugar”, but curiously enough, he was always first in line when cookies or cakes were about.

He was never without one of his signature bowties, and he actually taught Peter Kanter how to tie one. (To this day, Kanter still uses the instructions David gave him, on the rare occasion he has to tie a bowtie.)

He was a pillar of his community, singing in a men’s chorus, participating in Daffodil Days events for the American Cancer Society, contributing recordings to some of the first Reading for the Blind programs, and even doing the Penguin Plunge well into his 80s to raise money for the Special Olympics.

It was my privilege to work with David for over a decade, and I’ll miss him very much. And I know that I’m far from the only one who feels that way.

Farewell, David.

Thanks for visiting PuzzleNation Blog today! Be sure to sign up for our newsletter to stay up-to-date on everything PuzzleNation!

You can also share your pictures with us on Instagram, friend us on Facebook, check us out on Twitter, Pinterest, and Tumblr, and explore the always-expanding library of PuzzleNation apps and games on our website!