The History of Wine Country in the Sierra Foothills and the
Delta
It is impossible to study the history of wine country in the
Sierra Foothills and the Delta without knowledge of the broader
economic forces that have shaped the region since the
mid-nineteenth century.
Years Before the Gold Rush
Until the Gold Rush, Stockton and Sacramento were natural deep
water ports. The subsequent mining during the Gold Rush filled
the riverbeds with debris. These cities are still deep water
ports, but only because a path through the Delta is dredged.
The early economy revolved around the transport of goods to and
from these regional centers. However, the population was
relatively small and did not support a significant wine industry.
The Independent Miner: Impact on Wine Country
On January 24, 1848, James Marshall discovered gold in the
American River. When news got out, a flood of young men raced to
the region to seek their fortunes.
For a few years, miners searched streams throughout the Sierra
Foothills for surface placer. It was during these early years of
the Gold Rush that the romanticized notion of the
self-sufficient miner emerged. The mythological independent
miner is a part of California's identity to this day.
These miners had an incessant thirst for alcohol. This demand
led to the birth of the Sierra Foothills Wine Country. In 1856,
Swiss immigrant Adam Uhlinger planted grapes in the Shenandoah
Valley. These were the original vineyards in the Sierra
Foothills and were located in Amador County.
The wine industry boomed in the following years to satisfy the
need for alcohol amongst the miners. Despite the unhospitable
soils, rugged entrepeneurs continued to seek out new locations
to grow grapes and make wine.
Early vineyards were also planted to the north of Uhlinger's
original vines in the more elevated El Dorado County. In 1860,
Fossati-Lombardo was the first winery established in the newly
incorporated town of El Dorado.
At the height of the Gold Rush, there were over 100 wineries in
the Sierra Foothills. All evidence points to Zinfandel as the
primary varietal at the time. Wines were extremely rustic,
naturally very alcoholic and often fortified.
Industrial Mining: Impact on Wine Country
After the surface placer was discovered and mined, large-scale
operations took over. The idea of independent miners striking
their fortunes is largely a misnomer. It was true for the first
few years, but as with any major business opportunity in a free
market society, capital was rapidly pooled to profit from it.
The Pacific Stock Exchange was the epicenter of concentrating
the capital needed to undertake these massive operations.
Entire rivers were diverted with wooden flumes in an effort to
scour the dry riverbeds for gold. The scale of these operations
was monumental.
The mining industry also began to delve deep into the earth
through the practice of hydraulicking. Hydraulicking was the
process of literally blasting away mountainsides with
pressurized water. This tactic had immediate as well as
long-lasting implications for region's wine country,
environoment and economy.
To this day, there are man-made canyons that are hundreds of
feet deep in the Sierra Foothills from this process. Debris
washed downstream to the Delta and caused massive flooding and
devastation at the time. They also formed a base of silt which
is partly responsible for the current region's remarkable
productivity. However, the immediate economic benefits were felt
in the emerging metropolis of San Francisco.
The industrial and real estate fortunes of San Francisco were
tied not only to the actual gold of the Sierra Foothills, but
also the frenzy created by gold fever. A handful of wealthy San
Franciscans owned factories located south of Market Street that
produced the machinery needed for hydraulicking. They also owned
much of the real estate north of Market Street. They completed
their highly profitable cycle by using newspapers and magazines
to advertise the potential for vast riches to anyone who moved
to the area.
Large numbers of people moved to San Francisco and the
surrounding areas to claim their piece of the windfall. The
population increase sky-rocketed their land values and provided
an abundant and cheap labor force to extract more gold. The
burgeoning San Francisco skyline was a direct result of the
inverted skyscrapers that were the mines in the Sierra
Foothills.
The gold from these mines literally financed this urban
prosperity. It was unbelievably lucrative for a select few. The
immediate collateral effects of the whole process were the
devastated farmlands (including wine country) in the Delta.
Flooding was so common that the region became a shallow
extension of the San Francisco Bay for much of the year. Ships
could barely navigate the mud-choked waters of the once pristine
Bay.
Environmental Implications and the End of Hydraulicking
Forests were cut down with alarming efficiency to build flumes
to divert rivers. Because almost all the trees surrounding the
rivers and creeks in the Sierra Foothills were cut down, the
banks were not properly supported. This contributed to the
regular inundations downstream. In one exceptionally bad year,
the newly elected mayor of Sacramento had to travel by boat to
his inauguration.
The majority of the trees in the Tahoe area today are less than
150 years old. The old-growth was decimated during the Gold Rush.
Huge amounts of debris from constant hydraulicking filled
riverbeds and caused flooding in Delta farmlands that worsened
every year. Viticultural production in Lodi was adversely
affected during these years.
This boom cycle continued until January 7, 1884 when Judge
Lorenzo Sawyer of the Ninth Circuit Court outlawed the practice
of hydraulicking. He declared that the impact of hydraulicking
on the natural environment was undeniable. Political pressure
from agricultural interests in the Delta and the Central Valley
was also a factor. However, the most powerful objection to
hydraulicking came from the U.S. Navy. They could barely reach
Mare Island Naval Base through the clogged waterways.
The Bust, Prohibition, and Post-Prohibition Years
One of the defining periods in California's history had ended
and the economic repurcussions were massive. The town of
Fiddletown is an example of the impact of the mining bust. Once
a vibrant trading center, the population dwindled significantly
after Judge Sawyer's ruling.
Because wine country in the Sierra Foothills was isolated from
the rest of the state, planted vineyards in the region largely
avoided the devastation caused by the Phylloxera Louse at the
end of the nineteenth century. Because of this, there are some
exceptionally old vines still alive in the foothills today.
However, this isolation coupled with the disintigration of the
local market for wine (no more miners) had a severe impact on
the wine industry. When Prohibition became law, only the
Fossati-Lombardo Winery retained its bond to produce wine for
local churches. The wine industry in the Sierra Foothills fell
even further into oblivion in the decades immediately following
the repeal of Prohibition. Even Fossati-Lombardo Winery was
forced to shut its doors.
The Delta weathered these years more successfully. In the years
after the Gold Rush, many of the growers in Lodi began to form
wine producing co-ops to deal with the changing times. These
arrangements were largely successful for several decades.
After Prohibition was enacted, Lodi Wine Country continued to
produce grapes for home winemakers through the Volstead Act.
Heads of household were legally allowed to make a limited amount
of wine for personal consumption. The proximity of logistical
routes to Lodi made the business quite profitable.
The Flame Tokay and Zinfandel varietals were shipped all over
the country, often east of the Rocky Mountains. Cesare Mondavi
(father of Robert and Peter) came to Lodi from Northern Italy in
the 1920s. He began his career in the wine industry by shipping
grapes to the East Coast during Prohibition.
The Renaissance Wine Country in the Delta and Sierra
Foothills
By the 1950s, 7 major Lodi co-ops encompassed more than 600
independent growers. However, problems with this business model
began to arise. All the co-ops except East-Side were eventually
bought by major wine production and distribution corporations.
This is the basis for the current domination of big business in
Lodi Wine Country. The region has only partly emerged from the
jug wine era. Lodi is instrumental in producing grapes for White
Zinfandel. That being said, there are many high-quality,
limited-quanity wines from the AVA.
Wine production in Clarksburg began in 1968 when Warren and
Chris Bogle planted 20 acres of vineyards in the region. The
AVA's wine industry has grown considerably since then and
currently has a reputation for producing some of the best Chenin
Blanc in the United States.
Greg Boeger bought the old Fossati-Lombardo Winery in 1973 and
established the first Post-Prohibition Winery in the Sierra
Foothills. Since then, the region has steadily grown, and has
recently planted a significant amount of Rhone and Cal-Italian
varietals. Zinfandel remains the region's specialty.
The Sierra Foothills and Delta have played an extremely
important role in shaping modern California. Although these
regions are often thought of as peripheral, they are largely
responsible for the population and financial foundation that the
Golden State rests on today.