In the midst of the 47th American Crossword Puzzle Tournament, which took place from April 4 to 6 in Stamford, Connecticut, Will Shortz, the tournament’s founder, paused to chat with John Lieb of Boswords, who was livestreaming interviews with ACPT constructors and staff.
Lieb asked Shortz if he'd ever imagined that the ACPT, which began in 1978, would become such a phenomenon. “I wasn’t even sure about year two,” Shortz jokingly replied.
Five decades later, the ACPT is thriving. This year, a record-breaking number of contestants attended—889 to be exact—and another 346 participated virtually. The ACPT is also organized and staffed by a veritable who’s who of the “crossworld,” people like Tracy Bennett, who edits Wordle, and Adrienne Raphel, author of Thinking Inside the Box, a 2020 book about crosswords.…
