Normal daytime high temperatures are 37 on the first and drop only to 36 by the end of the month. Normal overnight lows are 24 on the 1st and drop to 22 by the 31st. Despite the normal highs, there is an average of 26 days during January when it fails to reach 32. The most number of sub-freezing days was all 31 in January of 1985. The lowest-ever recorded temperature during the month was -13 (which occurred on Jan. 24, 1882). The highest-ever temperature was 72 which occurred on the 26th in 1950.

The average rain fall total for the month is 3.99 inches with the most ever being the 10.55 inches that fell in January, 1979. (The least amount of rain was 0.74 inches the following year).

Snowfall? The average month total for the white stuff is 12.6 inches; the most ever: 35.9 inches in 1978 and the least: 0.4 inches in 1980. You may ask about the biggest snowstorm in Boston? 21 inches was the most snow ever to fall in 24 hours, which fell on Jan. 20, 1987. This was not "The Great Blizzard," which occurred in February of that year.

Normally in January, we see a little more than half the amount of possible sunshine (53%), with an average of 9.3 clear days and 15 cloudy days. The other 6.7 are somewhere in between.

All of this information was provided through years of record keeping at Boston/Logan Airport. It is not a forecast. Some of the averages may vary from town to town depending on local geography and the differences between city and suburb. For instance, Boston's average winter snow total is 41.8 inches, while Worcester's is 75 inches, which is a consequence of Worcester's 1000 foot elevation giving it generally colder temperatures than Boston.n