IMPORTANT NOTE: As of January 2015 MGWCC is a subscribers-only crossword. The cost is $26 per year, and you can subscribe (or get a free trial month first) here:

www.mgwcc.com

LAST WEEK’S RESULTS:

We were looking for a First Family member of the past 20 years who would have made a fitting final theme answer to this puzzle. Our five theme entries, starred for clarity, were:

1-A/95-A [*With 95-Across, Rome-born dictator (and this theme entry is a little different from the others)] = JULIUS / CAESAR

19-A [*Norfolk-born monarch (disputed but you’ll figure it out)] = ANNE BOLEYN. So the first two theme entries contain curious parentheticals.

34-A [*San Francisco-born director of “Any Number Can Play” and “No Time for Sergeants”] = MERVYN LEROY

68-A [*Rome-born Nobelist] = ENRICO FERMI

81-A [*French-born theologian] = JOHN CALVIN, ne Jean Cauvin.

First insight: each of these five clues mentions their answer’s birth city, which must mean something.

Second insight: lots of longish fill full of M’s ad I’s and C’s and D’s…hmm…

Put those two together and you’ve got the idea: each of these five entries has their birth year in Roman numerals ensconced in a grid entry. Like so:

Mervyn Leroy was born in 1900, or MCM = MCMASTER

Enrico Fermi was born in 1901, or MCMI = MCMILLAN

John Calvin was born in 1509, or MDIX = TOM DIXON

And now let’s look at the two parentheticals: Julius Caesar was born in 100 BC, which is the first three letters of CBCNEWS. That’s why it’s a little different from the others!

And Anne Boleyn’s birth year is disputed, but the two main camps say 1501 or 1507. “You’ll figure it out,” and if you got this far you certainly did; since there’s an MDI (1501) in SEEM DIRE but no MDVII anywhere, 1501 it was.

So which recent First Family member does this lead us to? The theme entries and their birth year hiders are all symmetric thus far except for CBC NEWS, whose grid twin DAMMING hasn’t been used. So we need a First Family member born in 2001, which leads to contest answer SASHA OBAMA.

It’s interesting how few truly famous people there are under the age of 16. I really wanted to use MMIX, but the best 2009 birth I could find is this person you haven’t heard of. And can this person really exist or is that a joke?

This week’s winner, whose name was chosen at random from among the 226 correct entries received, is Eric Conrad of Peaks Island, Me. In addition to1 a MGWCC pen, pencil, and notepad set, Joel will also receive a 1-year subscription to Peter Gordon’s Fireball Newsflash Crosswords.

THIS WEEK’S INSTRUCTIONS:

This week’s contest answer is a fruit.

Solve well, and be not led astray by words intended to deceive.