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By Julia Glum
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It's a pulchritudinous time of the year: the week during which the country becomes obsessed with cheering on genius kids, watching excitedly and turning them into temporary celebrities as they masterfully spell words most adults can't even pronounce.
It's time for the 90th Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Related: Quiz: How many Scripps National Spelling Bee winning words can you spell?
Bee Week, as it's called, kicked off Tuesday with the preliminaries test; continued Wednesday with rounds two and three of the spelling competition; and is set to conclude Thursday with the finals. Nearly 300 kids representing all 50 states as well as countries like Ghana, Jamaica and South Korea made it to the national contest.
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It's the event's 90th iteration, given that the first bee took place in 1925 but took a short break during World War II. The first-ever winning word was gladiolus, spelled by Frank Neuhauser; the most recent were Feldenkrais and gesellschaft, spelled by Jairam Hathwar and Nihar Janga, respectively.
As you get hyped for this year's contest, take a spin through 90 of the craziest words from the competitions:
- abecedarius
- poikilitic
- voortrekker
- guetapens
- xanthosis
- alopecoid
- ingluvies
- menhir
- schwarmerei
- gnathonic
- soubrette
- esquamulose
- elegiacal
- vivisepulture
- appoggiatura
- cymotrichous
- rhamphotheca
- opificer
- chiaroscurist
- succedaneum
- resipiscence
- stichomythia
- reseau
- neurasthenic
- wobbulator
- cyclazocine
- anadiplosis
- beccafico
- glissando
- mischsprache
- drahthaar
- esquisse
- kakiemon
- Wehrmacht
- sorites
- desiccant
- gazoz
- Jugendstil
- chresard
- urushiye
- bourride
- periscii
- infelicities
- abhinaya
- declivitous
- acciaccatura
- Troadic
- rapprochement
- scelidosaur
- bisagre
- sphacelated
- nyctinasty
- dodecarchy
- sforzando
- coreopsis
- brevicaudate
- chionablepsia
- yttriferous
- maieutic
- Gleichschaltung
- Götterdämmerung
- cicatrize
- projicient
- stochastically
- uitlander
- distichous
- euonym
- kirtle
- Watteau
- osteitic
- trouvaille
- apotheosize
- biliousness
- Qatari
- quadrumanous
- distichous
- grosgrain
- succedaneum
- resipiscence
- regnant
- equerry
- stillatitious
- brevicaudate
- numnah
- tralatitious
- succedaneum
- Australopithecus
- obmutescence
- paupiette
- serrefine
No big deal, right?
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