The Egyptians planned to build a dam at Aswan, which was going to submerge/destroy many great Egyptian historical sites: Abu Simbel, The Temple of Philae, The Temple of Amada and the Temple of Dendur. Christiane Desroches-Noblecourt, who worked for the Louvre and the French Resistance during WWII and hid artifacts around France to keep them from the Nazis, worked with UNESCO to figure out what temples needed to be rescued. Over 20 years, 22 temples were deconstructed, transported to new sites, and reconstructed. The scale of this project was immense! Another interesting part of this project was that First Lady Jaqueline Kennedy got the US involved in helping relocate these treasures. Anything by Lynne Olson is A Must Read!
