Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

July Hot, Extremely Dry In Nevada County

On the "Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson, skits were done on a theme of conditions.

Such jokes would be like "how fat was he..."

Well, July was similar with the heat and lack of rain. "How dry was it?" you ask. "It was so dry camels were carrying canteens."

OK, so maybe this is an exaggeration, but July was a dry month. According to John Teeter, local meteorologist, only a scant 0.17 inch fell in the 31 days making up the month.

There was a bit more rain in the southern part of Nevada County, according to Cale weatherman Davis Benton. This area received 0.88 inch, bringing the total to 35.04 inches for the year, still slightly above normal because of the excessive June rains.

The normal rainfall total for July is 3.85 inches. This left a 3.68 inch deficit for the month.

Usually the area receives 31.48 inches through the first seven months of the year, but, for a change, this number is on the positive side at 33.26 inches. This gives Prescott a 1.78 inch surplus of rain to date.

Teeter said measurable rain fell only one day out of the entire month, but the temperatures, though miserable at times, never broke the triple digit barrier.

Measurable rain came on July 23, with traces falling on July 4, 22 and 29.

The average daily temperature for the month was 81.8 degrees, with the highest the mercury climbed reaching a blistering 99 degrees.

The lowest it plummeted was a cool, and welcome, 60 degrees on July 25.

There were some pleasant days during the month, following the July 23 rain, where the temperature remained in the upper 80s. The lowest high for the month was 81, on July 23.

With so little rain, Teeter said, there were no watches or warnings posted during the month. Normally, four are recorded in July.

"We haven't experienced a 100 degree day," he said. "We remember the summers from 1930 through 1936, when each summer produced 60 or more days of 100 or hotter temperature."

The record high for the area is 112, recorded July 16, 1930.

"Those hot summers," Teeter said, "were before air conditioning was common. The only cool places in town were the movie theaters, and they did a booming business."

August, he said, is usually the driest month of the year with a normal rainfall amount of 3.23 inches. Along with this normally comes three watches or warnings, he added.