The Savannah morning news. (Savannah, Ga.) 1900-current, 1903-06-14

the desert region concerning the
sources of the saline deposits. Tho
most generally accepted theory is
that subterranean springs bubble to
adjacent bald and desolate foothills
at the base of the mountains some
twenty miles away, and then ooze
down among the yellow sands into the
basin of the desert, where il forms
lake. The hot sun evaporates the wa
ter leaving a crest of pure chloride OF
codium ten to fifteen inches thick and
acres and acres in area. Another the
DRY is that the salty water is the re-
mains of a great unusually saline
ocean that once occupied the desert.
The presence of tons of sea shells and
Whitened fossils of sea life about Sal
ton basin indicate that a sea once
foamed and roared where there Is now
a frightful aridity. The Indians be-
lieve that there is some subterranean
channel connection between the Pacific
ocean and the Salton Basin, and they
have a tradition that years ago one of
their good old men was taken in
canoe out into the ocean beneath the
mountains and under the alfalfa fields
along the Pacific shore.
For countless generations the Apache,
Maricopa and Mojave Indians have OBJ
tanned their chief supplies of salt from
ILLS uepOSlls DuL uINlA lliC <AAllCA ANe~iA
population grew to large proportions
in Southern California, some fifteen
years ago, no attempt was made to
harvest the salt there for commercial
purposes. The first efforts of white
men in this field were feeble. In the
summer of 1891 a lake, known then as
the Salton sea, formed by unknown
means in the middle of the withered,
dead desert The remarkable freak was
the wonder of the year, until it was
found that the water did not come up
from the earth, but emerged from the
Colorado river through a break in the
river bank in the vicinity of the boun-
Diary between Colorado and Mexico.
When the suddenly formed lake re-
coded. a large and richer area of salt
bearing waste was left, and from that
time a company utilized the deposit
on a more extensive scale. Last win
ter there came a dispute as to the
rights of the salt company to monopo-
lie the vast saline waste under the
government mineral land laws. and at
present the industry there has closed,
only to be more vigorously reopened
when the case will have been settled
in the courts.
Indians alone are employed in har-
vesting the salt for market, and in
midsummer even they find the heat so
intolerable and the. glare of the sun
so binding that they do most OF the
out-of-d door work at sunset and sunrise,
and wear dark-colored goggles Add
ed to the miseries of hard labor in this
roasting climate are the fortunes of
thirst amid an atmosphere so heavily
laden with saline odors. The Indians
are from the Coahilla tribe-noted in
California for its strong, resolute, pa
tient, laboring men-but none even of
these is able to endure the demands
upon physical endurance longer than a
few weeks at a time.
The methods of gathering the salt
are unique. Great heavy steam plows
are used to cut and break the crust
of the salt when it has formed in the
course of a week. These plows are
four-wheeled affairs, each controlled by
two Indians, and propelled by steam
AS the plow is propelled by a heavy
steel attachment rapidly beats the sa-
line crust into fragments, and another
attachment pushes the pulverized salt
to one side, leaving a furrow eight
feet wide and several inches deep IN
dams follow with hoes, separating the
chunks of salt crystals from any ad-
herring vegetable matter. OF the desert
plains. and form the salt into rows
Of conical heaps like haycocks on a
farm. A steam plow and gang OF
twenty Indians will plow and heap
I'D some 700 tons of salt in day.
A miniature steam railroad runs up
on tracks laid through the salt fields.
train of fiat cars runs out among
the heaps of salt and Indians shovel
the salt on. to the cars The product
is hauled to the mill a half mile away.
There it is dumped into enormous hop
pers and the crystals are reduced to
standard grades for market uses. Then
come boiling and sitting processes, and
then the salt is run through an aspira-
tor for it's refining. Lastly the pro
duct is sacked and labeled ready for
shipment to market.