Mary Alice Cannon Lambert's Meat Preservation through Salt

In the spring of 1848, while attempting to cross the Missouri River at Winter Quarters, the ice broke, and Mary Alice Cannon Lambert's wagon sank with most of her possessions. Everything was lost except for a sack of salt and some meat. When the wagon was raised later, the salt had preserved the meat, and it remained in good condition.

Fuller account of this event (as retold in History of the Cannon Family by David H. Cannon):

In the fall of 1847 we came up from Missouri intending to start out in the spring of 1848. In crossing the river on the ice, returning to Winter Quarters our wagon broke through with everything we had. The ice broke and everything went to the bottom. My sister stood on the river bank with her young son, her little sister and two small brothers, one hundred and fifty miles from her husband, and that six weeks before the birth of her second child. The men from town came, waded into the icy water and unloaded the wagon. Someone loaned her dry sacks and she saved most of her flour. Everything was taken out except a sack of salt and some meat; the salt preserved the meat and it was still good when the wagon was later raised.