In the early 1900s, the " Fun" section of the New York (1) World a Sunday supplement that presented puzzles to entertain the newspaper's readers. (2) One day, in 1913 the section ' s editor Arthur Wynne, was asked by his superior to create a new puzzle. (3) Inspired by a game called " Magic Squares" from his childhood, Wynne drew (4) up a variation that used a diamond-shaped grid with numbered squares in rows and columns. The puzzle was to be filled in with the answers to clues that corresponded to the numbered squares. He named his new creation a " word-cross."

After the puzzle's debut in (5) December. Requests from readers came pouring in for more word-crosses. Some readers even submitted puzzles of their own Wynne began including a word-cross in his section every (6) week. Usually one he wrote himself but sometimes a reader's submission. Eventually, the puzzles became known as "crosswords."

 By 1915, reader submissions arrived in such great numbers (7) that, Martha Petherbridge, Wynne 's secretary, began assisting Wynne in managing and editing the puzzles. Crossword devotees would complain if there was even a small (8) formatting flaw or factual error in the puzzles, so Petherbridge (9) checked carefully for typographical and content errors prior to printing. She also established firm rules for crossword layouts, including the introduction of square-shaped grids.

By the 1920s, the craze for crosswords went far beyond the World's "Fun" supplement. Songwriters released tunes with crossword—related lyrics. Fashionable women wore crossword-decorated dresses. (10) In line, fans of crosswords in crowds waited at the New York Public Library to use dictionaries to search for puzzle answers. And a fledgling publishing company became an immediate success when in 1924 (11) it released a smash (12) hit: the first book-length collection of crossword puzzles. Though the 1920s (13) was the time and age when crosswords were at the peak of the public's obsession with crosswords, (14) the puzzles and their cryptic clues continue to captivate audiences. (15) 

    [l]

“ Ghaa-yalh,'' Bud Lane says to his young granddaughter. [A] He's using a phrase from the language of his ancestors, words so old that they were spoken thousands of years before Europeans arrived in North America. [16] His goal is to teach her Coastal Athabaskan, a nearly extinct language spoken fluently by only a few members of the Confederated Tribes of Siletz (17) Indians, given that it is the language of their ancestors.

         [2]

Alfred (Bud) Lane III didn't grow up along the coast of Oregon, which is where the Siletz Reservation is located. He was born in 1957 in Guam, where his father was stationed in the military. As a young adult, Lane moved to the land of his ancestors to learn everything he could (18) about Siletz culture. The Confederated Tribes of the Grande Ronde created Oregon's first language immersion program to successfully teach the tribes' preschoolers to speak their native language, Chinuk Wawa. [19] He learned fragments of the Coastal Athabaskan language, (20) as in small pieces of the language, but he longed to converse in it. [B]

[3]

 Lane convinced Nellie Orton, a tribal elder (21) who knew the language well but never spoke it in public, to be his teacher [22] He produced language CDs and created an (23) online Coastal Athabaskan "talking dictionary," of words that had previously existed only in the few speakers' heads. [C]

[4]

In 2003, the tribal (24) council asked Lane whether he (25) were to have started language classes in the community. (26) Still, he soon resigned from his job at the local paper mill and began teaching at the Siletz Valley Charter School. [D] With financial help from a grant awarded to the tribe in 2008, (27) with these funds Lane organized a small staff to develop a formal language curriculum, including instructional materials accessible not only to schoolchildren but to all tribal members.

[5]

For Lane, a unique knowledge is embedded in the traditions of his forebears, (28) including medical knowledge. Language, he believes, is the life force of a culture, a source of stories, poetry, (29) history, and art. "Language maintains our view of yuhl-the world," he says.

[1]

Walking in Manhattan just south of the Brooklyn Bridge,(31)  feeling as if I've been transported back in time. The streets at the South Street Seaport are paved with cobblestones. [A] Bobbing up and down in the East River are (32) several, well-preserved, nineteenth century multi masted schooners the most potent link to the seaport's past, however, is the fishy smell coming from the East River. (33)

[2]

From 1822 to 2005, the Fulton Fish Market served as a vital link between the fishing industry and the New York City fish trade and was considered the most important wholesale fish market on the East Coast. [B] The market would open as early as 3:00 a.m. on weekday mornings, (34) this is when fishing-boat crews would bring their fresh catch in (35) to the East River. The distributors, in turn, would sell the fish to (36) buyers whom purchased seafood for local restaurants and stores.

[3]

[1] As I approached, I could hear a clamor of voices as hundreds of fishmongers and buyers haggled over prices. [2] Rows upon rows of carts and wooden bins packed with ice and seafood (37) was crammed into the building. [3] I remember the first time I visited the market. [4] Anyone new to the market would be overwhelmed by the variety of seafood (38) alone with live blue crabs, half-ton swordfish, twenty-pound tuna fillets, (39) fresh octopus. [5] Dodging forklifts, I made my way past bins of ice lined with fish laid side by side. head to tail, head to tail (40)

[4]

Today, (41) because of my passing by the building that once was the Fulton Fish Market, I listen to the excited voices of tourists who have come to visit the nearby Seaport Museum and shop at the Seaport Mall.  The area is still busy, (42) so the market itself moved in 2005 to the Bronx, where it now operates as the New Fulton Fish Market Cooperative.  It's easy to imagine, (43) likewise, the market still echoing around me here on Fulton Street. All I have to do is close my eyes and take a deep breath. (44)(45)

[1]

 Snails from the family Janthinidae spend most of their lives upside down, " surfing" the ocean's surface under (46) a cluster of air bubbles they create themselves. These "bubble-rafting snails" (janthinids) drift for miles, (47) moving up and down, feeding on jellyfish and other floating prey. [A] They use mucus to create a small raft of tiny air bubbles, permanently attached to the bottom of their bodies, which makes them (48) float in that way. In 2011, University of Michigan graduate student Celia Churchill published a paper that explains how the bubble rafters' incredible way of life evolved.

[2]

Churchill and her team began their research by analyzing and comparing the DNA of several snail families (49) determining the ancestral lineage of bubble-rafting snails. (50) Churchill, who found in her surprise that bubble rafters are most genetically (51) similar to wentletraps, a snail in the family Epitoniidae. Wentletraps live on the ocean floor, (52) they are creatures that feed on coral and sea anemones, and rarely if ever, come up to the water's surface. These snails use mucus to bind their eggs together into long (53) strands or egg masses that trail behind them as they glide across the ocean floor. Churchill asserts that (54) is the genetic precursor to bubble rafts.

[3]

According to the biologist, air often gets trapped in the egg masses of female wentletraps, forming small air bubbles. At one point, a wentletrap must have created enough bubbles to cause her to float to the ocean's surface. Given the abundance of jellyfish and other foods on the (55) surface creating air bubbles and floating became a (56) survival advantage.

[4]

Churchill argues that though the (57) ability to make bubbles on purpose didn't evolve quickly, (58) while certain lineages of wentletraps did develop this habit. These exceptional snails gave rise to the handful of bubble-rafting snail species known today. Churchill, in explaining how a few bottom-feeding wentletraps became janthinids skimming the ocean's surface, has (59) answered the question of how some snails became surfers. (60)

 In the 1980s, during time off from a backstage job in the world of Paris opera. Jean Paucton took a beekeeping course at the famous Luxembourg Gardens Shortly thereafter, the prop expert ordered (61) some. A hive-securely packed, sealed, and humming with life-arrived at Paucton 's workplace, the Palais (62) Garnier is a preeminent opera house in the city's historic district.

[1] Paucton's plans to (63) establish the hive to his home in the countryside fell through, and he found himself looking for a place to temporarily store his purchase. [2] Upon the roof, (64) an opera house fireman suggested (who was raising trout in the huge cistern below the Palais Garnier). [3] Paucton's bees have been (65) cared for ever since, high above elaborate productions of Carmen, La Boheme, and Cosz Fan Tutte. [4] Now in his late seventies, the beekeeper has expanded his project to five hives. [5] The annual harvest has grown to more than one thousand pounds of honey, which he bottles, labels by hand, and sells in nearby specialty shops. (66)

For all (67) its charm, Paucton's story has an increasingly serious (68) dimension. Since the mid- l 990s, (69) however, bee populations worldwide have declined (70) dramatically. Hundreds of thousands of hives have been disappearing every year. Pesticides, pollution, parasites, and disease imperil the insects, which rank among the top pollinators on Earth. Countless crops(71) - apples. cucumbers, almonds, avocados, broccoli, to name a few-simply won't grow as well without bees to pollinate them.

Surprisingly, bees in urban areas, where there are fewer pesticides and a far greater variety of flowering plants and trees, are faring better -- by far -- (72) then their country cousins.  While the (73) disorder, widely known as 'colony collapse,' defies a simple explanation, experts and amateurs, urban beekeepers among (74) them, have joined the effort to reestablish the health of all bees.  The ramifications for the agriculture industry and for the general health of the planet are grander than the grandest opera staged at the Palais Garnier.  (75)