“Be Careful What You Wish For” ~after St Teresa of Avila In the 1940s and early 1950s, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation planned to construct a series of Colorado River dams in the rugged Colorado Plateau spanning the states of Colorado, Utah, and Arizona. One of the sites originally selected by the Bureau was in Echo Park in Colorado. A small but politically effective group of objectors led by David Brower of the Sierra Club succeeded in defeating the Bureau's bid, citing Echo Park's natural and scenic qualities as too valuable to submerge. A new dam site near Lee's Ferry between Glen and Grand Canyons was finally agreed upon. At the time, Brower had not actually been to Glen Canyon. When he later saw Glen Canyon on a river trip, Brower discovered that it had the kind of scenic, cultural, and wilderness qualities often associated with America's national parks. Over 80 side canyons contained clear streams, abundant wildlife, arches, natural bridges, and numerous Native American archeological sites. By then, however, it was too late to stop the Bureau and its commissioner Floyd Dominy from building Glen Canyon Dam. Dominy was a firm believer in putting the river to human use, once saying "Now I admit that nature can't improve upon man. We're probably the supreme being." Construction on Glen Canyon Dam began on October 1, 1956. Two years later a desperate push to explore and excavate archeological sites began. Upon completion of Glen Canyon Dam on September 13, 1963, the Colorado River began to back up. The newly formed Lake Powell covered the canyons, streams and over 250 archeological sites dating back as far as 2,000 years in up to 500 feet of water. To paraphrase John Heywood from his book “A dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the prouerbes in the Englishe tongue, 1546, Look Before You Leap.