FORTY MILES OF SALT.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 62, 6 December 1907, Page 4

FORTY MILES OF SALT.

3 ■ GREAT SALT LAKE'S SOURCE. Scientists, geologists and tourists alike wi c bo interested in the huge salt beds recentl i discovered- by the engineers who aro buildin l f the Western Pacific Railroad from Salt Lafc j City to San Francisco. I Eight miles wide and forty miles long, th enormous saline deposit presents much th same , appearance as a polar ice floo, the e: feet of the glittering crystals stretching awn s to the horizon in lines of unbroken white bi . ing. one that cannot be obtained anywhei 1 else in the world except in the zones c s eternal ico. • So closely are the salt crystals packed t( e gother that the railroad ties are laid on th _ surface and 150,000-pound engines pass ove y them without making any impression on il d In placing the telegraph poles along the lin of the road, it was found necessary to bias 2 putthe salt with dynaniito, its hardness mat mg it impossible to dig down the eight tec '_ required to give support to the poles. Eigh feet is the deepest We which has been mad ' into the deposit, and its real depth re mains unknown. The commercial value c • this salt deposit, said to bo 98 per cent, pun 0 is very largo. Engineers who have studied the topoj , raphy of that part of the country arc incline to the belief that a largo body of water ur • derlies this salt bed, and that therein lie the explanation for the saline quality c 1 Great Salt Lake. The salt body is twentj 0 seven feet higher than the lake at the Mo'i mon capital, and the slope of the land nea the deposit is such that if water cxisto there it would flow in tho direction of th j lake. With this as a basis for their dedu< f tions, engineers who laid out tho road hav evolved the theory that some large.subtoi ranean body of water is gradually dissolvin ' the great salt bed from underneath an carrying it away in solution through uudei ground channels which lead to the Great Sal 1 Lake. In viow of the curious geological formatio of the country, in which' rivers disappes from tho surface and reappear miles awa with increased volume, the hypothesis i plausible at least, and will doubtless bo n vestigated upon a scientific basis as soon 'a the Western Pacific can handle passeng* j traffic. Borings through the salt-should di j termine in large measure the formation • the salt beneath the ■ surface, and shoul settle the question whether a body of watc is eating away the salt body on its lowc i- side. ■ ■■'.-• Government officials from the Weathc t Bureau are in the Salton basin studying evi f poration, and may take up the study of th 1 salt deposits when their present investig: f tions are concluded. 3 Leaving Salt Lake City, the Western Pac c fic'skirts the south end of tho lake, crossin t it at one point for six miles, where the watc . lies on both sides of the track. x At milepost No. 80 it enters tho Great An , erican desert. Hore, for nearly forty milei j the trains cross a sea of white alkali, glean ing in dry, dazzling whiteness in all dire( s tions. Looked upon with dread' in the daj when the prairie schooner was the best mean of transportation, tho desert will now becom an object'of curiosity. f The forty-niner, when he reached the edg f of this stretch of drought ridden territorj 3 drew a long breath, .so to speak, and plunge 5 across it with something the same feeling c . desperation with which a man facing . prairie fire would dash through thn flames. ! Near the west end of the desert lie the sal l beds, and here the dusty whiteness of_th 3 landscape changes to the sparklo of .a holida 3 postcard. Despite its hardness, the salt dt . posit evidently contains some moisture, fo it has been observed that all tics, telegrap ', poles and other wooden objects which com 3 in contact with it become moist to a poin r four or five inches above tho surface. , Though higher than Great Salt Lake, th j salt deposit has no grade in either direction I evidence that it w-as at one time in solutio: i in some body of water which evaporated. " Track laying over this hard, level surface j which required no ballasting and no blastini except for the telegraph poles, was a simpl and rapid operation, and the work occupied ; j remarkably short, time. j- It is hoped'that the Western Pacific will b j completed by the end' of noxt year,- and afte r that the tourist and the scientist will have n> I difficuly in visiting and observing this re I markablo; product of Nature's laboratory, j