My people came to Kentucky as hunters.
Having made that statement, let’s talk a little bit about salt. That saltshaker on your supper table, the one the doctor advises you to throw away or at least ignore because it is unhealthy, that saltshaker contains the mineral formula named NaCI. Salt is a compound substance made up of sodium and chloride ions. In spite of all the literature and health claims and the bad press, salt has been used by humans for thousands of years. I think it would be safe to say we humans would not be where or who we are today without salt.
Very early on, mankind grew weary of having to constantly hunt for each day’s food. If only there were some way to preserve one day’s bounty to be used, say on a day when it was too cold or wet to go hunting.
Salt…that was the answer. It wasn’t an easy answer, though. Salt was difficult to obtain. There are two main sources for salt, sea water which could be evaporated for the resulting salt crystals, or underground “beds” of the sodium chloride mineral halite or rock salt, which could be mined.
As salt came into common use for the preservation of food, the value increased and the difficulty of acquiring it created a rewarding source of employment.
In the late 1700s, certain areas in the Kentucky wilderness were found to have the mineral deposits that made salt production a viable and financially rewarding endeavor. This discovery came as hunter’s wisdom. Because salt is vital not only to preserve food, but to life itself, the wild game of the area, buffalo, deer, etc. all found their way to the “salt licks” where they could add the mineral to their diet by licking at the clay that held it. The minerals from the ground leached into the creeks and rivers and smart guys from the east knew that water could be boiled away to produce salt crystals. Many settlements or salt camps soon cropped up in the wilderness providing income and employment.
There is little doubt among historians that the discovery and production of salt was instrumental in the settling of Bullitt, Jefferson, Nicholas, Mason, Lewis, Henry, Boone, Carter and other counties in Kentucky. At the peak of production, salt produced in Kentucky was shipped as far south as New Orleans.[1]
Thus, my people came to Kentucky as hunters. They hunted the game that fed the workers at the salt camps and they hunted the game that other entrepreneurs preserved to ship to more urban areas or places without wild game and hunters. Not only did this salt production contribute to the early settlers and the areas surrounding the salt licks, it also served to contribute to the economy of the nearby river port of Louisville.
They came as hunters sometime after the Revolutionary War, but they brought their families and like many hunters with families, as the game began to dwindle, they faced two options: move on or stay…settling down, planting crops and their own family roots.
My people stayed. They staked claims, built homes, cleared fields. They became citizens interested in the politics and laws of the land, requesting recognition by the government they had fought to create. They sought statehood and accomplished that. They built roads and towns. They created a life from nearly nothing.
And I think they got bored. Because after nearly 20 years in Kentucky, when word came of the new territory being opened north of the Ohio River, with new land to be claimed, they decided to pack up all they had and move north.
If they came to Kentucky as hunters, randomly following the game, they came to Indiana as seekers with a goal: a desire to lay their claim, build their own community, start again in a place uniquely theirs.
[1] The Early Salt Trade of the Ohio Valley, Isaac Lippincott, Journal of Political Economy, Dec., 1912, Vol. 20, No. 10, pp. 1029-1052, The University of Chicago Press, URL: http://www.jstor.com/stable/1820548
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