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Displaced by Glen Canyon Dam

Glen Canyon Dam inundated Diné (Navajo) home sites, burial grounds, sheep grazing grounds, historic sites, and areas sacred to the Diné, Ute, Paiute, and Puebloan people. The creation of Lake Powell led to rising waters around Tsé Naní' áhígíí (Rainbow Bridge) and brought dramatically higher numbers of tourists to the sacred site, interrupting and forestalling Indigenous religious ceremonies. In 1974, Dinè litigants filed the Badoni vs. Higginson case, in which they requested that the government either build a diversion dam or control water levels in the lake to prevent the ground under Tsé Naní' áhígíí from flooding. Although the presiding judge ruled against the plaintiffs, the Navajo Nation later collaborated with the National Park Service to develop a management plan for the site.