Stan's pre-crossword careers included stints as a college teacher, consumer market researcher and Wall Street bond analyst. A crossword solver since childhood, Stan's entry into the puzzle business came about as a direct result of his winning three crossword tournaments in 1982, including the first U.S. Open Crossword Championship. He started a crossword newsletter in 1983, serving as its editor and publisher, and began creating crosswords for magazines soon thereafter. He also began publishing books of his crosswords.

After being ''involuntarily retired'' from Wall Street in the aftermath of the 1987 crash, Stan plunged into crosswords full-time, as a puzzle creator, editor, publisher, syndicator, and mail-order bookseller. Newsday was his first major client.

Today, the Newsday Crossword is syndicated worldwide to over 100 daily, Sunday and Internet newspapers. As a puzzle creator, Stan's work has appeared regularly in Prevention, People, Sport and Business Week magazines. And as a puzzle solver, he holds the world's record, set in 1996 under Guinness Book conditions, for the fastest completion of a New York Times crossword: 2 minutes, 14 seconds.

In 1990, Stan fulfilled a lifelong dream by appearing as a contestant on a TV game show. During his three weeks of appearances on The Challengers, hosted by Dick Clark, his cash winnings totaled $112,000, plus several cases of Rice-a-Roni and Niagara spray starch.

From 1993 to 2000, Stan was Publishing Director of Random House's Puzzles & Games division, and while there published over 200 titles from America's best-known sources. He is the author or editor of more than 125 of his own books, most published by Random House and available at bookstores and online booksellers. These include books of crosswords and word games, crossword reference books, his memoir/instructional manual Cruciverbalism, and 15,003 Answers: The Ultimate Trivia Encyclopedia.

Stan has organized and conducted scores of puzzle and trivia events nationwide over the past 20 years, including four seminars at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and, in 2007, the first crossword tournament ever held at Yale University.

He hosts the annual Crossword University™ cruise, where puzzlers improve their skills under Stan's guidance, and enjoy a week of puzzles and games aboard a luxury liner. Information on Stan's next cruise can be found here, or by calling 1-800-326-0373.

Stanley Newman lives in Massapequa Park, New York with his wife and has three grown children.