Salt Wagon

Before refrigeration salt was extremely important for preserving food so along parts of the coast saltpans were built for extracting salt from sea water. Making salt was so important that salt panners from excused from going to church on Sundays as the production was a continuous process. In order to heat the water coal was needed and the first railway in Scotland was constructed to bring coal from Tranent to the shore at Port Seton and later rerouted to Cockenzie Harbour.  In 1722 a Waggonway was made with the wooden wagons and this replica can be seen near the harbour outside the little museum where various artifacts can be viewed. 
As part of Archaeology Fortnight work was going on today to reveal part of the wooden railway and a turntable and the iron railway which replaced the wooden track in 1815.   Close by further excavations were going on uncovering two of the thirteen old salt pan houses that once stood beside the sea but now lie beneath the ground.  By 1716 the Cockenzie saltpans were the largest in Scotland and produced the equivalent of 500 tonnes a year but by the end of the 19th century increasing competition from foreign rock salt mines and concentrated brine wells in Cheshire made it uneconomical to boil sea water and the last two salt pan houses closed in 1939