Today's Puzzle
Thursday, September 10
"All trades, their gear and tackle and trim": the counter I'm holding in the photograph at left was a prized possession of my childhood, given to me by my father for the purpose of counting something on trips with him to Sacramento, Suisun, and the Sierra Nevada. For him, the counting was (and is) a professional activity; I did it for the love of numbers. What were we counting?
Hint, but I want to know what your guess was before you looked!
Other equipment carried by my father on these trips included a net and a tin of small envelopes; and I occasionally made use of pins and spreading boards when we got home.
Yesterday's Puzzle + Solution
While taking a walk in Oakland, I saw a fence with a placard similar to the one at left. I didn't know what "USS" was, but the three-star logo in the lower right made me think of a certain professional sports team, whereupon I realized that I
did know what USS stood for—and what city it was based in!
Do you?
(Bonus: Why is this kind of fence called a cyclone fence?)
Solution
The same three-star logo is used by the Pittsburgh Steelers, who (as you might imagine) take their name from their home city's most famous industry; USS stands for U. S. Steel.
As for the bonus question, cyclone (a.k.a. chain-link) fences are good at withstanding hurricane-force winds! The air passes right through them while exerting relatively little force on the fence due to its small surface area. If you've seen banners strung over a road with flaps cut in them to let air through, it's the same idea.
Congratulations to yesterday's solvers Jessica, Leo S., Atticus, Charlie, Yana, Newton, Inca, and Mr. Gregg!
About This Site
Though he now teaches mathematics, Dr. (né Mr.) Shapiro's first job in a K–12 school was as a lunch monitor in Davis, CA. It was there that he originated the Puzzle of the Day, even rewarding correct answers with tickets in denominations like "15 points" (though without a clear idea of how he'd ultimately redeem these). Dr. Shapiro's favorite puzzle from this pre-professional era was "Tell me the location of the beehive on this campus."
Ten years later, Dr. Shapiro revived Puzzle of the Day at Proof School, writing each day's puzzle on a name tag. After 600 puzzles or so, he was just starting to feel normal about students reading his chest all the time when campus closed and the puzzle, like the rest of our lives, moved online. New puzzles are posted daily on school days.
Want to catch up on old PotDs? There's an archive currently containing puzzles from March to June 2020.