Mills Canyon was the site of the Orchard Ranch, one of New Mexico's most spectacular horticultural enterprises, established by Melvin W. Mills of Springer and notable for its skillfully engineered irrigation system. The ranch cultivated 12 miles of land along the Canadian River. Vegetable gardens and thousands of fruit trees flourished in the 1880's and later. A destructive flood wiped out orchards, irrigation system, buildings, and other improvements in 1904, and they were never replaced.