I don’t consider myself to be a particularly superstitious person – in fact, if I see a ladder propped up against a wall I’m more likely to walk under it on purpose just for the hell of it.

So the fact that today is Friday, February 13, doesn’t bother me at all. I shall be taking the train into London tonight to meet up with friends without worrying that a crash is inevitable and I shall have a meal with them without worrying about food poisoning.

But, it seems, there are plenty for whom that isn’t the case at all.

Back in 1937. the owner of a Croxley house which had been numbered 13 asked Rickmansworth Council to give him a different number as he considered 13 unlucky. They agreed.

Not only that, but the surveyor said anyone else who wants to be treated similarly only has to ask.

“Does this mean that what is regarded as an unlucky number – why, nobody knows – is to disappear entirely from Rickmansworth streets?” asked the Editor’s leader in the Watford Observer of February 19, 1937. “Are the old 13s all to become 11a, to the confusion of postmen and tradesmen?”

Getting on for 80 years later we know the answer, of course. But it was certainly quite a talking point at the time. In fact there was a suggestion that those living in number 13 could apply for a horseshoe to help offset the bad luck with some good luck.

The leader column continues, with its tongue placed firmly in its cheek, as follows:

“Other considerations arise. Neither the council nor any of its committees should, to be consistent, meet on the 13th. Official letters and documents should not bear that objectionable date and under no consideration must 13 loads a day be taken to the Mill End dump.

“Some say there is luck in odd numbers but that, of course, is silly superstition. Is not Friday also unlucky and should it not be made known that under no conceivable circumstances must ladders be placed in the streets so that people are forced to walk under them?

“Would it not be a good idea to issue public warnings against the terrible consequences of spilling salt or crossing knives?

“But wait! Here is the chairman of Chorleywood Women’s Section of the British Legion saying that in the section’s 13th year they had won two cups, so 13 must be their lucky number. There is something wrong somewhere.

“If it be true that there’s nae luck about the 13 house, there must be scores of unfortunate people in Rickmansworth to say nothing of Watford.

“They must suffer in silence for there are no more groans heard from No 13 than from No 11 or No 15.

“Still, we have not the heart or the courage to criticise the instructions of Rickmansworth Council, for they have contributed very agreeably to the gaiety of the district.”

While we’re on councils and quirky stories involving them, 40 years ago tomorrow [February 14, 1975], the Watford Observer published a story about a man who, after a row over how much money he owed for his rent, dumped a cheque made out on a two feet by one and half feet paving slab at Watford Town Hall.

The man “would have made his point even stronger,” the story reads, “if he had remembered to date the cheque. As it was, he did not, and the cheque, wrapped in a brown paper parcel, had to be referred to the drawer – it could hardly be said to have ‘bounced’.”

The story continues: “‘It is incomplete,’ said town hall spokesman Andrew Finnegan. ‘In all other respects it is a legal document, provided the bank is prepared to accept it. I have been in touch with the bank manager concerned and he is prepared to accept payment.

“‘We have written explaining the situation as far as the rent account is concerned. We would like him to come and take the thing away and give us a more conventional cheque.’

“Mr Finnegan said the idea was getting past being a joke. He had been told that in another area, according to a national periodical, someone else had paid a cheque on a concrete paving slab in a dispute over paving slabs,l and that seemed relevant.

“What the council hoped to avoid was the possibility of cranks trying to outdo each other in this way.”

I bet they do! Actually, that sounds like a grand idea to me.