Dam removal is a growing practice to address fish passage barriers, often occurring in convergence with other infrastructure objectives, such as reducing safety and financial liabilities for dam owners and permitting processes that require reducing negative environmental impacts, among others. Thus, the pathways to dam removal can be as varied as the dams and the landscapes on which they occur, but they tend to require a common set of catalysts and actors to reach. In this presentation, I will summarize some of those key catalysts and actors that drive decisions to remove a dam, in particular summarizing the pathway that led to the Klamath River dam removals and how that pathway intersected with dam removal design. I will conclude with a short summary of some of the early responses to dam removal on the Klamath River to illustrate the full life cycle of dam removal decisions, design, and outcomes.