|
|
|
Las Salinas,
the Salt Pits by J. M. Guinn
|
|
|
|
|
|
1907, "Las Salinas (The Salt Pits)"
by James M. Guinn, Publication of Historical Society of Southern California, Volume
VII
|
|
|
LAS SALINAS (THE SALT PITS).
BY J. M. GUINN.
Under the Spanish and Mexican regime there were but few articles manufactured in
California. The people were agriculturists and stock raisers. Few, if any, skilled
mechanics came to the territory. There was no demand for their labor. Not only the
few luxuries that the wealthier inhabitants were able to indulge in but also the
necessities were shipped into the country. Even that very necessary condiment, salt,
for many years after the first settlement of the country, was brought from Mexico,
although there were salt springs and lakes near the settlements and fields of the
ready-made article on the desert.
About the year 1815 the first expedition to secure a supply of salt set out from
the pueblo of Los Angeles for the sink of the Colorado desert, where many years
later the Liverpool Salt Works were established at Salton on the Southern Pacific
Railroad.
Every spring after the winter rains were over and before it had grown oppressively
hot on the desert an expedition was fitted out to make the trek for the yearly supply
of salt for the villagers. The creaking old carretas with their massive wooden wheels
were loaded with a supply of provisions and bedding. A detail was made from the
Mission Indians to drive the oxen, an Indian to each ox; the adjacent missions joined
in the trek and received a share of the salt. A squad of caballeros from the pueblo
guards acted as a mounted escort to protect the cavalcade from the mountain Indians
who were hostile and to prevent the Mission Indian ox-drivers from running away
and joining their Gentile kinsmen.
When all was ready the caravan set out on its toilsome journey— across the green
valleys of San Gabriel Mission's wide domains, up through the pass of San Gorgonio
and down into the desert below the sea level where fields of crystaline salt lay
glistening in the hot sunshine, but where now the waves of Salton Sea break on the
desert strand.
The carts were quickly loaded and the return journey begun. It usually took about
a month to make the jornada para sal—the journey for salt. On the return the salt
was divided among the missions that had contributed help, and to the different households
of the pueblo. The supply was intended to last a year.
Under Mexican rule a more liberal spirit prevailed and foreigners were allowed to
settle in the country. Many of these were artizans and as a result some of the most
needed and most used articles were manufactured in California. In the early '30's
salt works were established at the Salinas, a place within the limits of what is
now the seaport City of Redondo. Here there was a laguna or lake formed by the waters
of salt springs which carried a high percentage of salt. The salt was extracted
by boiling in kettles or by evaporation in the sun. It was found to be cheaper to
manufacture salt than to bring the ready-made article from the desert. The treks
to the desert ceased and the jornada para sal became one of the forgotten episodes
of California history. I find no record of it in any history of the territory. My
information was obtained many years ago from an old pioneer who was cognizant of
these events.
The manufacture of salt increased until it became a paying institution. The paisanos
of the old pueblo had salt to sell to their neighbors up and down the coast. The
salt works seem to have been communal property. Each householder having a right
to make salt or to share with his neighbors in the products of the salt pits. The
missions derived their supply from the Salinas. This was resented by the Anti-Mission
politicians of the pueblo one of the most active of whom was Juan de Dios Bravo
or Brabo—John, Valiant of God—Juan was a vinatero—a wine merchant on a small scale.
He was one of the landless and looked with avaricious eyes upon the missions' vast
estates. He was a regidor in the Ayuntamiento of 1835. This was after the decree
of secularization of the Missions had been passed by the Mexican Congress but before
it had been enforced.
Juan, of the holy name, introduced into the Most Illustrious Ayuntamiento a resolution
to place a tax on the salt and brea used by the Missions. In his argument in favor
of a tariff he said, "The ex-Missions still maintain their proud old notions
of being the owners of all the natural products of forest and field. They will not
allow any wood to be taken to build a hut or to fence a field even when they are
paid for it, alleging in justification of their refusal that there is not enough
to supply the Indians of the ex-Missions." "Now admit," says Juan
of the holy cognomen, "that these wretched people should have their wants supplied
in preference to the people of this town, therefore I say the friars of the ex-Missions
should pay a tax on the salt and brea from our springs they use for their Indians."
The eloquence of Juan, the Valiant, moved the town council to appoint a committee
to consider his tariff for revenue scheme. At the next meeting the committee brought
in the following report: "To the Most Illustrious Ayuntamiento:
"The committee appointed by you to consider the scheme proposed by Regidor
Juan de Dios Brabo in relation to monopolizing the Salinas (salt pits,) and placing
a duty on brea (mineral tar used for roofing), having examined said project thoroughly
we find that in relation to selling the salt at public sale it is not feasible,
being that the production is fortuitous and being that the Most Excellent Diputation
must decide this matter and it should be informed of the same. In the meantime,
a duty can be placed on salt of two dollars a bushel to neighboring Missions that
might need it.
"In respect to placing a duty on brea we do not know that there has ever been
a demand for the same by said Missions, but in the future if there should be the
tribunal of this pueblo will fix a price which will be adjusted according to the
quantity used. This is all the committee has to say on the matter.
"Angeles, June 19, 1835."
The Ayuntamiento adopted the committee's report and thereafter the frairs of the
ex-Missions had to pay two dollars a bushel to salt their Indians—but salt would
not save them. After the American occupation of California the salt works seem to
have been run on a co-operative plan, the operatives taking their pay in salt and
disposing of it as best they could.
In 1853 Johnson & Allanson, a mercantile firm doing business in Los Angeles bought
the works. The following account of the salt works is taken from the Los Angeles
Star of September 26th, 1856:
"Situated about sixteen miles southwest from the City of Los Angeles is a salt
lake or pond from which is manufactured salt of first rate quality. The lake is
nearly two hundred yards wide by about six hundred long and is supplied by springs
upon its western bank. It is about two hundred yards distant from the ocean, above
which it is elevated from six to ten feet. It would appear at first sight that it
was supplied from the ocean but such is not the fact as has been proved by frequent
experiments. The existence of this lake has long been known to the natives of the
country, and from it they were formerly in the habit of drawing their supply of
salt by shoveling it up from the bottom. The missionaries who first settled here
also knew of its existence and claimed its proprietorship but made no attempt to
improve the natural resources of the lake.
"Some years since this valuable property came into the possession of two gentlemen
of this city—Messrs. Johnson and Allanson— who have expended a large amount of capital
in the erection of the necessary works for the manufacture of salt by artificial
as well as solar evaporation.
"The water is drawn from the lake through an iron pipe by means of a force
pump, and is conducted into a reservoir, from which it is led by a wooden pipe into
the kettles in the boiling house. This building is about eighty feet long and contains
fortyeight kettles, which are kept constantly heated. As the salt forms in the kettles
it is removed and water added in proportion to the evaporation. The salt on being
removed from the kettle is ready for market, only requiring time to dry. The process
is very simple and the production of salt abundant from the intensely saline quality
of the waters of the lake.
"In regard to the amount of fuel consumed it is estimated that each cord of
wood produces a ton of salt. By solar evaporation the salt is produced at the cost
of the tanks and attendance. There are five tanks in operation; they were cleaned
up this week for the first time, and found to have answered all the expectations
of the proprietors. That one in which the water was of least depth proved most productive.
"The daily average product of the kettles is five tons. They require to be
cooled down for cleaning once in ten days. Each tank or vat. yields about a ton
of salt in crystalized form. The salt is at present all hauled to the landing at
San Pedro at a large expense.
"The water of the lake is so strongly impregnated with saline constituents,
that a rtick placed in it will be coated in ten days an inch thick with rrvstaliied
cubes. We saw some of them which were very beautiful.
"It is a singular fact that within twenty yards of the lake good fresh water
is obtained within fifteen feet of the surface. Two wells of about this depth and
about twenty feet apart supply fresh water to the workmen.
"Messrs. Johnson & Allanson intend sending samples of their salt packed in
satin bags to the State Fair."
Johnson & Allanson endeavored to create a market for their product in San Francisco
but they encountered that barrier that since the dawn of civilization has wrecked
many a pioneer enterprise—the cost of transportation. They had to haul their products
from the salt works to San Pedro in wagons, then lighter them out to anchorage.
The freight charges on vessels up and down the coast then were high. It cost ten
dollars to ship a barrel of flour from San Francisco to Los Angeles. When the product
arrived at San Francisco beside the freight, there were wharfage charges, dravage.
storage and commissions to middle men and other men. When the product finally reached
the consumer the producer often faced a deficit—actually had to pay a penalty for
producing a needful and needed commodity. Salt could be shipped as ballast in sailing
vessels from New York via Cape Horn to San Francisco, sixteen thousand miles, cheaper
than it could be transported from the Salinas to the Ray City. The manufacturers
were compelled to limit their production to the local demand and the scheme of building
a great salt making center at the Salinas went a glimmering. Recently I obtained
from Mr. George W. Hazard, whose father at one time was the manager of the Pacific
Salt Works, as the Salinas was latterly called, the loan of an old account book
which contains the business transactions of these works from 1854 to 1864. It gives
in words and figures a terse history of that industry in its prime and in it decline
but it stops short of its demise.
In 1854 when the first entries were made in the old book the industry was evidently
in a flourishing state and wages were high. Erastus J. Richmond between November
1st, 1854 and April 1st, 1855 is credited with five months' labor at $200 per month,
a total of $1,000. He is debited with "orders" to the amount of $1,000, but whether
orders were for salt, cash or merchandise, the bookkeeper does not inform us—he
knew and posterity might guess what Richmond got. Charles P. Rrittan receives $100
per month. After April 1855 there was a cut in wages and in 1856 another cut. The
wages of the ordinary employees had been reduced to $40 per month and in each man's
account was an entry saying that 26 days shall constitute a month. There were no
Saturday half holidays then, and no labor unions. The laborers put in ten good hours
for a day's work. Looking over the list of the early employees at the salt works
we find that nearly all of them were Americans, although the labor element of Southern
California was then largely Mexican and Indian. The names of only three foreigners
appear on the roll—Joaquin, the Mexican, Dutch John and Achilles Mores. The latter
was a Greek and possibly a distant relative—distant about three thousand years—of
the Greek demi-god Achilles, who was shot in the heel at the seige of Troy. A Trojan
sharpshooter lodged an arrow in the one vulnerable spot in the make of the Greek
hero. A modern saw bones would have amputated his heel. The operation would have
been successful—but the patient died all the same. The old Greek surgeon let him
die with his heels on, which was a more glorious death for the hero than to be amputated
to death by a saw bones.
Our modern Achilles did not lose his life at the seige of Salinas, although he was
a splendid loser. He began work October 17th, by the 27th the record states, he
had lost seven days, then he lost his job, and honest Dutch John, who seems to have
been too poor to own a surname took his place. German Johanes had no Greek gods
roosting in his family tree, but he knew how to make salt and that was as honorable
an occupation as fighting Trojans.
There are a number of entries in this old account book that, while trivial in themselves,
illustrate customs, usages and business methods of half a century ago. And for that
reason are worth recording. There was a boarding house at the Salinas where the
employees took their meals. Refugio Boteller seems to have had the contract to supply
beef. Beef was sold at $4.00 per quarter of an animal, small or large. In the account
with Refugio appears this item:
"One quarter of beef sent back because the meat had been taken off the ribs."
The meat over the ribs was considered by the Californians the choice cut of the
animal. Evidently Refugio, catering to the fastidious taste of some favored patron,
had attempted to deprive the salt makers of a choice tit bit, but he discovered
to his cost that the American working man is an autocrat in appetite, and will have
the best the market affords.
A store was kept at the Salinas and the debits for articles sold give us the market
price of some commodities fifty-five years ago— 25 pounds of sugar, $3.50; 100 pounds
of flour, $6.00; a box of Lucifer matches, 50 cents, and three pieces of soap half
a dollar. The size of the pieces is not given. Matches were just coming into general
use. The smell of sulphur that always accompanied the lighting of the old style
of match impressed the user with the idea that it was the invention of a gentleman
named Lucifer, who is supposed to have a corner on all the brimstone in the infernal
regions, hence the name, Lucifer match. In 1858 Johnson & Allanson sold the salt
works to Francis Mellus, who was conducting a large mercantile business in Mellus
Row, corner of Aliso and Los Angeles streets. A considerable amount of salt was
still produced. One entry in the old account book named states that A. M. Hazard,
who was the manager of the Pacific Salt Works for Mellus, delivered to him in August
and September, 1859, 47,500 pounds of solar and lake salt. Francis Mellus died in
1860. His widow retained the works and continued to operate them until the business
was finally abandoned. The boiling process of extracting was given up on account
of the increased cost of fuel and the salt was extracted by evaporation only. Two
crops were taken off each season. In 1879 four hundred and fifty tons were produced.
In its crude state at that time it was sold at prices ranging from nine to thirteen
dollars per ton, but when ground it brought from eighteen to twenty four dollars
per ton. Mrs. Trudell (formerly Mrs. Mellus) owned a salt mill in Los Angeles where
the salt was ground and put up for the market.
The extension of the Southern Pacific Railroad to Yuma in 1881 and the building
of the Liverpool Salt Works at Salton in the desert where there were vast fields
of salt ready made that could be had for the gathering, killed this old-time industry
which for half a century had supplied Southern California with salt. The railroad
followed the trail of the salt caravans of the early years of the last century but
the iron horse consumed less hours in the journey than did the patient oxen weeks
in dragging the cumbersome old carretas in the Jornada para sal.
Such, in brief, is a fragmentary and half forgotten chapter of the industrial history
of Southern California. Many an enterprise that was launched in the long ago, fostered
and promoted by the labor and limited capital of the pioneers of the territory has
been crushed by the remorseless wheels of Progress; and the "demnition gwind"
will go on and on forever. Sometimes in our optimistic moments we flatter ourselves
that we are building for posterity—that future generations will rise up and call
us blessed—that the structures we are rearing and the enterprises we are promoting
will immortalize our names. Time passes. The memory of our deeds fades. The generations
that follow us laugh in scorn at the puny structures we were so proud of—batter
them down and build skyscrapers on their ruins.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|