Fred Dixon, 89, the longtime, near-legendary owner of Dixon Apples — a business fixture in the Cochiti Canyon for six decades — died Friday at his home in Greenleaf, Idaho.

Over the years, Dixon created two varieties of apples, the Champagne and Sparkling Burgundy, which he patented. Dixon's development of the two varieties are considered an integral part of New Mexico's agricultural history.

Dixon's granddaughter, Becky Mullane, who with her husband, Jim Mullane, operate the 60-acre apple orchard, said memorial services will be held at 10 a.m. June 16 at Calvary Santa Fe church, 2520 Camino Entrada.

He will be buried next to his wife, Faye, his childhood sweetheart, in Delta, Colo.

Dixon had suffered for many years with emphysema.

When he began with what is now Dixon Apples in 1944, Dixon had nothing but "a red horse, a white mule and a stone boat," Becky Mullane said Sunday. "He built everything from that." Mullane said Dixon and her grandmother Faye's first home on the land had mud floors and no indoor plumbing. They had two sons, Richard, now of Duluth, Minn., and Dan, of Greenleaf, Idaho.

Dixon eventually took over management of what was then more of a dude ranch than an apple business from James W. Young, who later sold the acreage to The University of New Mexico. Mullane said her family leased the land from the university until 2007, when the university traded it to the State Land Office.

Mullane said her grandfather was raised in an apple orchard owned by his father in Austin, Colo., and before he settled at Rancho de la Cañada near Peña Blanca, he had worked as a roofer in Napa., Calif.

Mullane, then in Duluth, joined her grandfather in the orchards of Rancho de la Cañada after Faye Dixon died in 1985. Mullane and her grandfather operated the orchards by themselves for eight years, before she met Jim Mullane. The couple have been running the business since 1996.

Becky Mullane said that as her grandfather's health began to fail in the 1990s, he encouraged her to take over.

She said Dixon told her "there's no reason why you can't do this."

"He gave me so much opportunity."

Dixon, struggling with his emphysema in the high altitude, eventually moved to Idaho to live near his son Dan, but he made frequent trips back to Peña Blanca over the years.

His last trip to the orchards was in November of 2008, his granddaughter said.

The family has virtually always sold the apples only at the orchard. If you want a Dixon apple, you have to drive there to buy one. And you can't order a Dixon apple over the Internet. The family tried shipping apples as a gift venture, but the apples just weren't the same by the time they arrived at their destination.

At one point, Dixon tried selling his apples in grocery stores, but that was less than productive because the "Dixon" name became diluted with apples from other areas — such as Dixon, for example.

Becky Mullane said the family feared losing the "identity of a Dixon apple," so the decision was made to sell the apples only from the orchard at harvest time, usually after Sept. 10. "We really didn't need the middleman."

Dixon apples taste better than others grown in New Mexico or other parts of the country, she said, because of the lava-rich Cochiti soil and the altitude.

To business associates, Dixon was considered a conservation-minded grower, and "the kind of man who epitomized what was good in any businessman," said Sol Taylor, 97, of Albuquerque.

Taylor, who sold pumps and other water equipment to growers, said he knew Dixon from the time the two first connected in the mid-1940s.

"I knew Fred from the time he moved to New Mexico," Taylor said. "We were in business, but we became very good friends. I am very proud that I had the opportunity to know a man of that caliber."

Besides Dixon's own Champagne and Sparkling Burgundy apples — names more than likely acquired from Dixon's years in the Napa wine country — the orchard also grows Red Delicious and Red Rome apples.

Becky Mullane said the family has no intention of changing how they grow and sell Dixon apples. "He always told me, 'Be good to the canyon, and the canyon will take care of you.' "

ON THE WEB

• For more information on the Dixon orchards, visit www.dixonapples.com.