Times of the Islands Summer 2022

astrolabe newsletter of the Turks & Caicos National Museum
Above: This color postcard pictures men barreling salt. A barrel holds three bushels of salt.
Below: The postcard shows workers (women!) filling bags with salt next to an outdoor salt deposit. A bushel of salt was equal to 1.13
American bushels.
women holding the bags for the 3 men who shoveled salt
into the bags, 2 men to carry the bags to the lighter and
a shore captain.
A lighter could carry 400 to 500 bags of salt. Loading
a 200-ton freighter usually required 4 lighters and took
one day. Staging was set up on
one side of the freighter being
loaded with salt. Crew from the
lighter passed bags of salt from
man to man until it reached
the deck of the vessel. The
bags were then emptied into
the freighter’s hold. An assistant
Revenue Officer, posted
onboard during the loading
process, counted the number
of empty bags to tally the royalties
owed the government—the
empty bags were then taken
back to the salt deposit to be
refilled. In 1909 the royalty was
70 cents per 100 bushels.
The number of bushels of salt exported varied from
year to year depending on the weather, the political situation,
and the price salt commanded. For example:
70 www.timespub.tc