California Wine History

Certainly wine, as a natural phase of grape spoilage, was "discovered" by accident, unlike beer and bread, which are human inventions. The first efforts at grape cultivation can be traced to the area that forms the "Fertile Crescent", around the Caspian Sea and in Mesopotamia, including portions of present-day Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, and Turkey.” Wine has been dated from times as far back as biblical times around 500 B.C. These places are where wine was originated. Ancient Greek wines were coarse and are now considered to be a concentrate. Egyptian wine was viewed as a lesser wine because they imported wine in from the Greek. Over time wine has become a more popularized beverage. Wine was more often drank in continents such as
Mission grapes were the top grape until the early 20th century. It was during the California Gold Rush that the oldest wineries in California were produced. Many East Coast dwellers moved to California in search of gold to get rich and it led to a great increase in the population and it created commercial wineries that are still here.Chinese immigrants served a great role in California winemaking. The immigrants were in search of jobs to take care of their families and became planters, pickers, and winemakers. “Some even assisted as winemakers prior to the passing of the Chinese Exclusion Act which severely affected the Chinese community in favor of encouraging "white labor." By 1890, most of the Chinese were out of the wine industry.” Grape phylloxera was a plant pest that overpopulated and ate at the grape crops. This epidemic wiped out a vast amount of little wineries and dented in larger wineries. Because of grafting, some large wineries were able to salvage some of their crops as well as return to their original amount of land and vines used and went on to adding different kinds of grapes to their
Constitution–which banned the manufacture, transportation and sale of intoxicating liquors–ushered in a period in American history known as Prohibition.” During this time wine was the only alcoholic beverage that excused from this because it was used for religious reasons, mostly communion. Wine was protected by the Volstead Act. Due to the ban of other adult beverages, there was an influx of wine drinking. People began making their own beverages in their homes. Most wineries were forced to close because of the lack of business and the law banned it. “It took time for the Californian wine industry to recover from this setback.” It took twenty seven years for them to come back. Wine had evolved. Because of its new makers, technology, and kind of grapes, wine was finer than it ever was. At this point, other countries in the world started to recognize California for the quality wine they produced. In the Judgement of Paris Californian wine, both white and red, was beating their competition who had been in this industry much longer and were well known for wine. The Judgement of Paris was a “Blind tasting was performed and the judges were asked to grade each wine out of 20 points.” There were eleven judges Due to this competition, California was starting to be respected for their wine rather than looked down at. “ A California wine rated best in each category, which caused surprise as France was generally regarded as being the