How a Navajo Legend Predicted the Future

According to a Navajo story of their origin, their ancestors had to make a choice when entering the world. They had to pick one of two yellow powders—yellow corn pollen or yellow uranium dust from the nearby rocks. They chose corn pollen, believing it possessed the positive elements of life, whereas uranium was an element of the underworld. The gods approved of their decision and then issued a warning. Having made their choice, the Navajo were to leave the yellow dust in the ground. If it was ever removed, evil, death and destruction would be unleashed.

For many years, all went well in the Navajo Nation around Monument Valley. But uranium extraction began in the early 1920s when the US government opened the area to exploitation. With the development of atomic weapons in the 1940s, mining in the Southwest ramped up even more. About four million tons of uranium were extracted from hundreds of mines in the valley. Most of the local Navajo workers were not informed of uranium’s hazardous effects.

Children played on the mine tailings and families lived in traditional hogans with uranium in the walls and floor. Years later, the EPA found the gamma radiation there to be 80 times higher than what was considered safe for human exposure. The Navajo death rate skyrocketed, along with the rate of birth defects.

Moving was not an option for the Navajo. Their bond with Mother Earth is an important foundation of their culture. Families bury the umbilical cords of newborns on their land, binding each child to the place he came from.

The mines closed in 1986 but cleanup efforts were initially quite small. In 2011, the EPA allotted $40 million to remediation of the Skyline Mine. In the first step, 20,000 cubic yards of contaminated dirt were scooped from the valley floor and hauled to the top of Oljato Mesa. There it was buried in a carefully engineered landfill carved out of the rock, then waterproofed and topped with a high-tech plastic lid. The Navajo were very happy that the yellow dust was put back in the ground where it came from—and where they thought it should have been all along.