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(Source: History of Jackson County, Ohio
by D. W. Williams - Vol. I.
The Scioto Salt Springs - Jackson, Ohio 1900)
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THE END - In 1817, the State, with
the consent of the General Government, donated Section 29, of the
Scioto Salt Reserve, for the site of the new county seat, the town
of Jackson. A joint resolution of the Ohio General Assembly
adopted Jan. 3, 1818, declared that experiments at the Scioto Salt
works, had failed to find water of a sufficient quality to render it
an object to the State to retain lands reserved at said works, and
asked permission of the General Government to sell the lands.
Congress was slow to act, and the Legislature on Feb. 18, 1820,
authorized the agent to lease lands for cultivation or pasture.
An act of Jan. 25, 1823, fixed the agents salary at $60 a year.
Congress acted at last, and on Dec. 28, 1824, it passed a law
permitting the state to sell its salt lands, and directing that the
proceeds be applied to such literary purposes as said Legislature
may hereafter direct. On Feb. 7, 1825, the Legislature passed
a law providing for the survey of the salt lands, and for making two
maps of the same, a report of all to be made by Dec. 25, 1825.
The agent employed Hon. Joseph FLETCHER, of
Gallipolis, to make the survey, and the whole tract was laid out in
eighty acre lots. The Legislature on Feb. 7, 1826, passed a
law providing for the sale of the Scioto Salt Reserve in June of
that year, the sale to be held for three days, and the lots
remaining unsold to be disposed of at private sale. There was
no further use for the office of agent of the Scioto salt works, and
it was abolished, and all laws relating to leasing salt lands
repealed, by an act passed Jan. 26, 1827, the disposal of the lands
baeing placed in the hands of Daniel HOFFMAN, the agent for
selling lands. Thus ends the history of the Scioto salt works
as state property.
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