A half century of daring defiance to federal restrictions, land-partitioning and forced removal policies and in the aftermath, traditional elder resisters are gone, small sheep herds remain, corn fields and livestock are gone, vital natural springs and roads are in disrepair, and the ancient ritual practices nearly extinct. This unspeakable and alarming conditions continues within the U.S. “Big Mountain Legacy, Last Stories of Díneh” film is a crucial message.

4/12/2025 UPDATE with much gratitude:

Greetings again, everyone. Thank you so much for your understanding with generosity! We've raised just under half of the goal amount thanks to your contributions, and it's truly making a difference for making submissions to upcoming film festivals, fall 2025 and spring 2026. The amount we had raised also brings that promise to initiate a few more film screenings and travel expenses included. We're just $1800 away from achieving our goal. If you feel moved to help, a donation of just $50 or even $100 would certainly accelerate efforts towards organizing screenings in key communities. There are many out there in charitable need also, and it’s realized if you can't donate right now, but please share this fundraiser with your network! Your support means a huge blessing to my endeavor. Thank you again, with much respect, Bahe.

Imagine an indigenous culture in the 1960s that composed of five big communities situated in an isolated pristine region of northern Arizona. And suddenly a law is made which obliterated that culture within 45 years. Let me share with you what it is like in the aftermath or today, there is only emptiness, no more sounds of bells from the herds, no more seasonal ritual gatherings, no more pulsation of men singing, no more cornfields, no more evening outdoor cooking fires that twinkle like distance stars. Silent. Nearly all the non-English speaking elders are gone and how they had wished to tell their stories gone, too.

I grew up there and many years later, I volunteered as an interpreter and translator for the non-English speaking elders. I am not a scholarly writer nor a professional video editor, but such a Legacy on this high desert country had to be preserved. This film is raw and produced on a small budget however, its content is a genuinely indigenous presentation and sadly, another irreplaceable culture in the U.S. Now, will you help to double the impact of your gift of kindness and understanding? It takes one friendly donor like you with your gift to support a restoration of knowledge and history. Help me afford to do this project to coordinate screenings and most of all, to enter film festivals. And Thanks to many of you who have given to the early stages of this production, and now how you are compassionate for a better educated world, your gift can fuel an awareness about the Last Stories of Díneh.

Traditional Díneh (navajos) story tellers’ crucial messages about earth's future based on their past. It is about a 400-year history of cultural survival and maintaining identity. In 1974, they were notified that their communities would be uprooted and will never see their ancestral homelands again. Now 50 years later, only 20 home sites remain out of 800 winter and summer home sites prior to 1977. In the 1920s and 30s these story tellers were born into a different state of fear –a re-emergence of livestock extermination that came with the 1860s Indian Wars. Then again when they reached elder hood in 1974. The 1974 Executive Order, relocation law was not their overall stories, instead they shared memories from their ancestors that date back to the times of the Spanish Conquest, 1580-1848. Those periods of brutal attacks were the “Times of the Great Fear.” Their predictions now are that futures "may lack guidance" for humanity, "colonization would have depleted itself," and only calamity may come. The past may be the only guide

Trailer: https://vimeo.com/848932137

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