Once a peripheral form of entertainment, crossword puzzles have become a popular national institution. They appear in almost every newspaper, have become the focus of people's daily and weekend rituals, are published in their own books and magazines, appear in foreign languages—including Chinese—and have inspired other gridded word games like acrostic, cryptic, and diagramless puzzles.

Arthur Wynne constructed the first crossword, which appeared in 1913 in the New York World. His word puzzle consisted of an empty grid dotted with black squares. Solvers entered letters of intersecting words into this diagram; when correctly filled in, the answers to the "across" and "down" numbered definitions would complete, and hence solve, the puzzle. The layout and concept of the crossword has not changed since its inception.

Although crossword puzzles appeared in newspapers after Wynne's debut, the New York Times legitimized and popularized the pastime. The Times's first Sunday puzzle appeared in the New York Times Magazine in 1942, and daily puzzles began in 1950.

Further Reading:

Shepard, Richard F. "Bambi Is a Stag and Tubas Don't Go Pah-Pah."New York Times Magazine. February 18, 1992, 31-9.