by contributor Donna Shor
Photo credit: Andrew Dubbs
HOP PRESS CLUB SPELLING BEE
Laughter, quips and an occasional groan filled the air at The National Press Club ballroom when politicians vied with journalists in a spelling bee contest.
“The contest celebrated the 100th anniversary of the historic spelling bee,” said the club’s heritage chairman Gilbert Klein. In 1913 The National Press Club held a contest pitting lawmakers against journalists that drew a crowd of 1000 including President Woodrow Wilson, members of his cabinet and William Jennings Bryan. Last man standing then was an Ohio congressman; time marches on and this year’s lineup saw a woman, Rep.Anna Eshoo, on the political team along with three senators and five House compatriots. The journalists numbered three men and six women.
Mark Russell
Mark Russell set the tone for fun early with his trademark political patter sung to his own piano accompaniment. Russell followed his lighthearted but take-no-prisoners lyrics with a couple of skits and yucks: “Anthony Wiener walks into a veterinarian’s office with his dog. The vet asks “Do you want him neutered,” and the dog says “Yes.”
The team of journalists—“out there without the net of a spell-check” said Russell―included, in the democratic and alphabetic order in which they came up to the plate, Huffington Post’s Howard Fineman, Ed Henry of Fox News, CBS News’ Major Garrett whose delivery was a bit hampered by the enormous mass of gum he was chewing throughout, Kate Nocera of Buzzfeed, Politico’s Rebecca Sinderbrand, Roll Call’s Meredith Shiner, Ashley Southall of The New York Times, Karen Tumulty of The Washington Post and Reuter’s Toby Zakaria.
Ed Henry
Sexy and skin-tight was the style of some of the journalista’s outfits. The politicians, sporting more somber duds, included Rep.Matt Cartwright (PA), Rep.Gerry Connolly (VA), Sen. Chris Coons (DE), Rep. Peter DeFazio(OR), Rep. Ted Deutch (FL ), Rep. Anna Eshoo (CA), Sen. Jeff Flake (AZ), Sen.Tim Kaine (VA), and Sen. Chris Murphy.
At the official’s table were judges Paige Kuble and Heidi Hamilton (who dinged a bell when a speller blew a word) and Time’s Katy Steinmetz, the organizer extraordinaire, Peter Sokolowski of Merriam-Webster who pronounced the words as each speller came to the mike. Contestants got one free pass, but on a second word wrong, they were out.
The crowd roared at the first word given to an eye-rolling Rep. Matt Cartwright―it was potato―shades of Dan Quayle! In 1992 the veep went down in flames at a sixth grade spelling bee when he “corrected” a boy who had written “potato” on the board, saying it ended with an “e.” Cartwright managed it with flying colors.
Sokolowski, whose Merriam-Webster definitions were the final rule, gave the differing acceptable pronunciations of each word, raising some eyebrows at his variant “in-dom-IT-able. He also gave the meanings and answered questions―which were usually stalling-for-time queries while contestants gathered their thoughts: Howard Fineman, tongue in cheek when given alternate pronunciations by Sokolowski,“Which do you prefer?”
Virginia’s representative, jolly Gerry Connolly, commented when Sen. Chris Murphy went down in flames on “somnambulist” : “He spelled better when he was in the House.”
Karen Tumulty
The women journalists held on longer, five women going against three men, then two men and finally, only Senator Tim Kaine was left to face Rebecca Sinderbrand and Ashley Southall. Kaine had consistently given the crispest, fastest correct answers of the evening, though he did fail on “fuchsia.”
Smiling, he took off his coat and sat down beside his two opponents, asking Peter Sokolowski “Can we call it a tie?” Nothing doing. The women held on a bit, then first he New York Times, then Politico were retired.
Kaine was declared “The Best Speller in the United States” and presented with adictionary (unnecessary for him) and a trophy cup (shiny). Harking back to “fuchsia” the senator said “I’m not good with colors, but I did get “nonpareil.”
We’re not sure if it will be a hundred years to the next bee, but this was certainly an engaging and eentertainig nght.
