This site exists largely due to the patient encouragement of Dan Chall and Lukas Karlsson, who expressed an interest in making our pre-computer and previously published Atlantic Monthly and Wall Street Journal variety cryptics available to aficionados. By the time we retired from our puzzle-writing labors in December of 2023, Lukas had managed to convert them all to downloadable files, posting them here for solvers' personal use with our blessing.
We blush to admit that our first published puzzles, starting in September of 1977, were created in a state of cheerful ignorance. With no tools fancier than pencils, graph paper, and a few desktop reference books, we did our best to imitate the cryptic crosswords of Stephen Sondheim and Richard Maltby from New York magazine; but our efforts were guided less by discipline than by enthusiasm. While we feel apologetic about the messiness of our early work, we regard this trove as a fossil record. Anyone crazy enough to solve all our puzzles in chronological order will see an evolution in style, with the strict "no-connectors" philosophy of Fraser Simpson becoming evident toward the end. In any case, we welcome you all. We thank Dan and Lukas for their persistent dedication to this project, we salute today's creators who continue to expand on the cryptic form in their own styles, and we're grateful to devotees who are spreading the word via media whose existence we never dreamed of when we were getting started. Cheers!
—Emily Cox and Henry Rathvon (12/31/23)