My second attempt at an Ubercross got a lot more attention, some of it deserved. It was much smaller than my first, at only 50 squares by 50 squares, but I hoped the Ubercross Fiddy would still be a record-setter.
This time, I was trying to do the largest “American-style” crossword puzzle, one that followed the NYT rules: no uncrossed letters, rotational symmetry, no two-letter words, and perhaps most importantly, no repeated words. The software I was using excluded repeated words anyway, although it couldn’t help with conjugations…one early draft of this new puzzle had RHINOCEROS and RHINOCEROSES both in the grid, and that was a little too much for me.
This got me some mainstream media coverage, but in the course of getting such attention, I learned the awful truth: I was 61 years too late to claim the prize. The true record-holder was a 111-by-111-square puzzle done in 1949 by Robert Stilgenbauer. It was a bit of a slog by modern standards, but it followed the rules—and was over twice my size.
Nevertheless, this puzzle got a much better reception than my first attempt had. I’d consulted with a few pillars of the crossword community—among them Amy Reynaldo, who served as my editor, and Brendan Emmett Quigley. And it was just a happier solve, with lots of big, crunchy answers justifying its size: HEY—HOW ABOUT NEVER, HEAT PROSTRATION, MISS MISSISSIPPI, SET A GOOD EXAMPLE. Stilgenbauer gave me a new goal to go after, but crossword-lovers loving my crossword gave me the energy to continue the quest.