Phew! Tuesday was the most sizzling day of a hot week and at 3pm the shade temperature in Garston was 88 to 89 degrees F.; report meteorological instrument makers F. Darton & Co. Ltd., of Vale Road, Bushey. This was the highest shade temperature recorded locally this year.

Temperatures outdoors in the sun, and in some offices and factories, soared well over the 100 degrees mark the same day.

Climax of the sultry night which followed was a fierce storm of thunder and vivid lightning in the early hours of Wednesday morning, but the only incident to which firemen were called was when the roof of a Croxley Green house was set ablaze by lightning.

[From the Watford Observer of July 10, 1970]