12-letter words containing w, o, r, a
- off-broadway — experimental or avant-garde drama produced in New York City, in small theaters, halls, churches, etc.
- onward march — the continuing, advancing or improving movement (of situation, etc)
- opera window — a narrow, fixed window on each side of the rear passenger compartment of an automobile.
- packed tower — A packed tower is a tall distillation vessel which uses packing.
- pasch flower — pasqueflower
- pasqueflower — an Old World plant, Anemone pulsatilla, of the buttercup family, having purple, crocuslike flowers blooming about Easter.
- passage work — writing that is often extraneous to the thematic material of a work and is typically of a virtuosic or decorative character: passagework consisting of scales, arpeggios, trills, and double octaves.
- patrol wagon — an enclosed truck or van used by the police to transport prisoners.
- peacock worm — feather-duster worm.
- periodic law — the law that the properties of the elements are periodic functions of their atomic numbers.
- polar wander — the movement of the earth's magnetic poles with respect to the geographic poles
- poll watcher — a representative of a political party or of an organization running a candidate who is assigned to the polls on an election day to watch for violations of the laws that regulate voting, campaigning, etc.
- postcardware — Shareware that borders on freeware, in that the author requests only that satisfied users send a postcard of their home town or something. (This practice, silly as it might seem, serves to remind users that they are otherwise getting something for nothing, and may also be psychologically related to real estate "sales" in which $1 changes hands just to keep the transaction from being a gift.)
- pot-walloper — (in some boroughs before the Reform Bill of 1832) a man who qualified as a householder, and therefore a voter, by virtue of ownership of his own fireplace at which to boil pots.
- powder flask — a small flask of gunpowder formerly carried by soldiers and hunters.
- powder paper — Pharmacology. charta (def 2).
- power assist — a procedure for supplementing or replacing the manual effort needed to operate a device or system, often by hydraulic, electrical, or mechanical means.
- power factor — (in an electrical circuit) the ratio of the power dissipated to the product of the input volts times amps
- power hammer — a type of mechanical hammer operated by compressed air and used by blacksmiths, metalworkers, and manufacturers
- power vacuum — a situation when a government has no identifiable central authority
- power-stream — to stream and watch (multiple videos, episodes of a TV show, etc.) in one sitting or over a short period of time.
- powerboating — a boat propelled by mechanical power.
- powerwalking — a form of exercise that involves rapid walking with arms bent and swinging naturally.
- prairie fowl — prairie chicken.
- prairie wolf — coyote (def 1).
- praiseworthy — deserving of praise; laudable: a praiseworthy motive.
- property law — the branch of law dealing with issues relating to land and houses
- push forward — keep advancing
- quo warranto — (formerly, in England) a writ calling upon a person to show by what authority he or she claims an office, franchise, or liberty.
- radio window — the range of wavelengths at which the earth's atmosphere is transparent to radio waves.
- rainbow bird — an Australian bee-eater, Merops ornatus, with brightly coloured plumage. It feeds in flight and nests in sandy burrows
- rainbow fish — guppy.
- rainbow flag — a multicoloured flag used as a symbol of peace; often used to represent gay and lesbian pride
- rainbow roof — a gable roof in the form of a broad Gothic arch, with gently sloping convex surfaces.
- randallstown — a city in N Maryland, near Baltimore.
- raoult's law — the principle that the fraction by which the vapor pressure of a solvent is lowered by the addition of a nonvolatile, nonelectrolytic solute is equal to the mole fraction of the solute in the solution.
- ratchet down — If something ratchets down or is ratcheted down, it decreases by a fixed amount or degree, and seems unlikely to increase again.
- rate of flow — the rate at which a liquid or other substance flows through a particular channel, pipe etc
- reality show — A reality show is a type of television program that aims to show how ordinary people behave in everyday life, or in situations, often created by the program makers, which are intended to represent everyday life.
- review board — panel appointed to reconsider a matter
- right of way — a common law or statutory right granted to a vehicle, as an airplane or boat, to proceed ahead of another.
- road sweeper — a person who sweeps roads
- road warrior — a person who travels extensively, as on business trips
- rock wallaby — any wallaby of the genus Petrogale, having a banded or striped coat, slender body, and long legs and feet, inhabiting caves and rocky areas in Australia.
- rollaway bed — a bed on castors
- round barrow — a funerary barrow having a bell, disk, saucer, or pond shape, primarily of the Bronze Age and containing the cremated remains of corpses along with grave artifacts.
- sage sparrow — a small gray finch, Amphispiza belli, of dry, brushy areas of western North America.
- sale of work — a sale of goods and handicrafts made by the members of a club, church congregation, etc, to raise money
- satin-flower — a Californian plant, Clarkia amoena, of the evening primrose family, having cup-shaped pink or purplish flowers blotched with red.
- say the word — If someone says the word, they give their approval as a sign that something should start to happen.