Word: spelldown
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1950-1959
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...such growths as distichous, objurgation, ephelis, abatis and coulisse, that few can spell and few, least of all the handful of youngsters still competing in the ballroom of Washington's Sheraton-Park Hotel, can translate into everyday English. In the second day and the 19th round of the spelldown, 13-year-old Betty Morgan, whose horn-blowing, flag-waving claque from Washington's St. Thomas Apostle School had cheered her through spinosity, serriform and caliginous, choked up on chiaus. Only four spellers were left: Stanley A. Schmidt, 14, entrant of the Cincinnati Post and station WCPO (each contestant...
Washington's vast Federal Security Building. "Office of the Secretary," it read, in shiny new gilt letters. Beyond the door, in a mulberry-and-cream office, Oveta Culp Hobby, the nation's first Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, was beginning the biggest spelldown of her career. She looked small and feminine behind her broad mahogany desk, but she moved with the poise and confidence of a successful business executive, as she checked "yes" and "no" on a long list of requests for appointments and telephone priorities. Now & then she paused reflectively and puffed on a Parliament, then...
| 1 |