Cadillac Desert: The American West and Its Disappearing Water

by Marc Reisner

Initially, the Three Tribes pleaded with the government not to build Garrison Dam at all. “All of the bottom lands and all of the bench lands on this reservation will be flooded,” wrote the business council of the Three Tribes in an anguished resolution condemning the plan. Most of it will be underwater to a depth of 100 feet or more. The homes and lands of 349 families, comprising 1,544 individuals, will be covered with deep water. The lands which will be flooded are practically all the lands which are of any use or value to produce feed for stock or winter shelter. We are stock-men and our living depends on our production of cattle. . . . All of our people have lived where we now are for more than 100 years. Our people have lived on and cultivated the bottom lands along the Missouri River for many hundreds of years. We were here before the first white men stepped foot on this land. We have always kept the peace. We have kept our side of all treaties. We have been, and now are, as nearly self-supporting as the average white community. We recognize the value to our white neighbors, and to the people down stream, of the plan to control the River and to make use of the great surplus of flood waters; but we cannot agree that we should be destroyed, drowned out, removed, and divided for the public benefit while all other white communities are protected and safe-guarded by the same River development plan which now threatens us with destruction. . . .