Got Salt?

Got Salt?. Without it, No Civilization and No Ice Cream!. , Salt is an important compound. Our lives depend on it and the economy of many cultures thrive on its trade. Salt harvesting has a long history in the Bay Area, beginning with the Ohlone Indians. Early salt production included gathering salt from natural salt pannes (shallow ponds), and burning marsh plants, which were then mixed with water creating a brine, which was evaporated over campfires., The demand for salt by the hide and tallow industry prompted the first salt farmer, John Johnson, to buy land near Eden Landing. In 1853 he scraped up 25 tons of salt, the first commercially produced salt in the San Francisco Bay Area. Johnson received $35 per ton for that first harvest, a tidy sum for the time., Soon, salt making became big business and many small family-operated companies sprang up. Over the years they were consolidated into larger companies. Today one remains in the Bay Area-Cargill Salt, Newark., (photo captions:), 1) Jessen Landing: An artist's rendering of the Jessen family salt farm, typical of such operations in the Eden Landing area of Hayward in the late 1800s., 2) Salt Collecting: Workers collected the salt by hand and moved it to the processing plant in wheelbarrows along movable wooden walkways, circa 1900., 3) Modern Harvesting: Technological advances allowed for increased salt production through the use of powered harvesting and collecting machinery, circa 1920., 4) Salt Gathering: After the water had evaporated, workers gathered the salt into small piles by hand, circa 1900., 5) Archimedes Screw: Wind powered Archimedes screws moved water from the Bay and into and out of each evaporation pond in succession, until the salt was harvested. Notice the young boy playing in the slough, circa 1900.,