HANAPEPE, Kauai >> On a warm summer afternoon, Tina Tani­guchi was on her hands and knees scraping dirt off an oblong depression in the ground. Thick brown hair peeked out from her coconut leaf hat.

Common on just about any restaurant table or grocery store shelf. Probably even in your own kitchen cabinet. And yet, such simple grains of salt have a long history, from ancient times to today. Here ...

Pick up a salt shaker and really look at it. It seems pretty boring now, a table staple that gets sprinkled on fries or lost in the back of a kitchen cabinet. For most of human history, though, salt ...

On a warm summer afternoon, Tina Taniguchi was on her hands and knees scraping dirt off an oblong depression in the ground. Thick brown hair peeked out from her coconut leaf hat. Splotches of mud ...

Four major archaeological discoveries have filled critical gaps in the understanding of ancient salt production in China, revealing how this essential strategic resource was extracted and processed ...