If people recall 130+ F temperatures in their past, it is an artifact of aging. 134 F, the hottest temperature in US history, was at Greenland Ranch in Death Valley on July 10, 1913. That location is now called Furnace Creek. Although 129 F has been seen there many times since, never has the magic 130 F level been passed again. I spent a summer in Phoenix and have driven through Death Valley in August, but the 120 F I saw on a bank building in Tempe was the hottest I have expreienced in person. Phoenix that day had a official 121 F. Blythe or Needles, both along the Colorado river, have high humidity and feel much worse at 117 F than any other place I have been.

World record right now is 136 F at Azizia, Lybia.