Word: softener
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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...further area where taste, artistry and individuality are paramount. No two master tuners will tune a piano exactly alike, nor will any master tune a piano the same way for different occasions. A piano that is perfectly tuned and "regulated" (by fluffing up the felt hammers to soften tone) for a broadcasting studio will sound all wrong in Carnegie Hall. A piano that is to accompany a violin is adjusted differently from one that is to accompany a cello. A tuner with a sensitive personal touch will tune pianos differently for different pianists. Virtuosos such as Josef Hofmann...
Ambassador Thurston seemed to have tried, so far as correctness allowed, to soften the Dictator's vengeance. But during the days of terror which followed the revolt, all El Salvador was sheltering fugitives. Priests lent their robes. Protestant ministers helped. The embassies of Costa Rica, Peru, Guatemala, Spain (and probably others) granted sanctuary. President Jorge Ubico of Guatemala, though a tyrant himself, allowed fugitives to cross his borders, gave them money to get to Mexico. But the U.S. Embassy closed its doors against them...
...Unconditional surrender" was coined at the Casablanca Conference in January 1943. Prime Minister Churchill pointedly gave President Roosevelt full credit for it, told the House of Commons that he "concurred." Its acceptance altered, toughened British propaganda policy toward Germany. Both Churchill and Roosevelt repeatedly tried to soften the harsh threat by assuring the people of enemy countries that unconditional surrender would not mean their destruction. But the propaganda weapon they put in Hitler's hands could not be offset by qualification...
Derived from pine-tree sap, the powder is a cheap (less than $5,000 per mile of 40-ft. road), quick road-builder. It works something like sizing in coated paper; a mixture of about 1% of Stabinol in ordinary soil prevents water from penetrating in sufficient quantity to soften it. A resin-stabilized road stays so dry that even when it is covered with a layer of water a truck driven over it throws up a trail of dust. Stabinol does not waterproof sand (because sand lacks a binder to make it solid) and it does not work...
Even if the Germans were not knocked out, the air drive would soften Germany, make beachhead losses lighter when the invasion finally came...