Oliver Lee Memorial State Park preserves both Dog Canyon’s desert landscape and the nineteenth-century ranch of Oliver Milton Lee at the base of the Sacramento Mountains near Alamogordo. A rare perennial stream made Dog Canyon important for human settlement for thousands of years, from Paleoindian hunters and later Indigenous peoples to the Mescalero Apache, and it also figured in conflict during the Apache Wars. Lee settled here in 1893, built an irrigated ranch, and became a prominent but controversial figure in territorial politics and the Albert Jennings Fountain case. Established in 1980, the park also protects geologic features, trails, and broad views across the Tularosa Basin.