Fort Yuma is probably the hottest place on earth. The thermometer stays at one hundred and twenty in the shade there all the time – except when it varies and goes higher. It is a U.S. military post, and its occupants get so used to the terrific heat that they suffer without it. There is a tradition…
that a very, very wicked soldier died there, once, and of course, went straight to the hottest corner of perdition, – and the next day he telegraphed back for his blankets. ~Mark Twain, Roughing It, 1872, chapter LVI
