Oldies, but Goodies

In Sonoma County, wine goes back to a Russian settlement on the coast in the early 1800s. A few years later the northernmost California mission came to the town of Sonoma with the mission grapes coming along. The first commercial winery started in the mid 1800s.

Here's a look at some of the currently operating historical wineries, listed in order of when they were established. It's a story of immigrants from different parts of Europe.

 

Buena Vista, 1870s
Sonoma County Library

 

Buena Vista Winery, Sonoma Valley
Founded in 1857 and considered the birthplace of the California commercial wine industry. The founder, Agoston Haraszthy, a Hungarian immigrant, is called the Father of California wine for his writings and leadership on modern winemaking techniques. Buena Vista has gone through ups and downs and multiple owners over the many decades, with a lot of changes and restoration done by the current proprietor, who moved here from Burgundy, France.

Charles Bundschu, business partner of founder
Jacob Gundlach, marries Jacob's daughter,
Francisca, in 1875
image from gunbun.com

Gundlach Bundschu Winery, Sonoma Valley
G-B, or Gun Bun, was founded in 1858 just a few months after Buena Vista and a couple miles away. The Gundlach and Bundschu families were from different parts of present-day Germany. They've had vineyards from the early days, but had their production and storage was in San Francisco when the earthquake and fire put them out of business. The Bundschus moved to the Rhinefarm Vineyard in Sonoma after the earthquake. A descendant, Jim Bundschu, started up the winery again on their Sonoma property in the early 1970s. G-B is now run by his son. Yes, they like to abbreviate the name after realizing no one could pronounce Gundlach Bundschu Gewürztraminer.  :)

 

Foppiano family, way back when
image from foppiano.com

Foppiano Vineyards, Russian River Valley
Giovanni Foppiano arrived in America from Italy in the 1855. He made his way to California and, in 1896, bought an existing vineyard and founded Foppiano Vineyards. The family's best story was during Prohibition, when the feds raided and made them dump 10,000 gallons of wine in the local creek. Word got out, and the locals took buckets or whatever they could find to the creek to scoop up the free wine. There have been modernizations of the winery along the way, but they still crank out that old style Petite Sirah. After the death of Louis J. Foppiano at 101, grandson of the founder, family squabbles became public. The historic family winery was recently sold to an outside, but local, vintner. Hopefully, he keeps the family history in mind when making the inevitable changes.

 

Ruins of the 19th century Drummond Winery,
on the Kunde property
image from kunde.com

Kunde Winery, Sonoma Valley
Established in 1904 by Louis Kunde, a German immigrant, with the purchase of the Wildwood Vineyard in Sonoma Valley. The previous owner, John Drummond, brought cabernet cuttings from Bordeaux, and made what was probably California's first cabernet sauvignon. The winery shut down with WWII when family members went off to war. They expanded their vineyard holdings, sold grapes, and raised cattle for several decades, until 1990 when the family built a new tasting room and production facility. The winery part of the operation was sold several years ago, and the family is back to strictly farming now.

Samuele Sebastiani
image from Sonoma County Winegrowers

Sebastiani Vineyards, Sonoma Valley
Samuele Sebastiani, originally from Tuscany, established the winery in 1904 in the town of Sonoma. In the 1960s, his son August Sebastiani saw that the future was in premium wines. He contacted his friends, the Kundes, for the grapes.  After August's death in 1980, mom and sons argued about their future direction. One son, Sam, split from the winery and founded Viansa Winery. Sebastiani Vineyards went through various phases, but stayed in the family until the sale in 2008.

There are other families that have farmed grapes since the 19th century, but got into the winemaking business much later, or not at all. Some of these are:

• The Dutton family, 6th generation farmers, spawned Dutton Estate and Dutton-Goldfield Wineries in the 1990s 
• The Martinelli family of grape and apple growers opened their tasting room in 1993 with Helen Turley as head winemaker.
• Robert Young Estate Vineyards came from a family of cattle ranchers and prune growers. Robert Young began the movement to wine grapes in the 1960s.
• Tom Schmidt runs the Tzabaco farm/vineyard that has been in the family since 1856. The land was first planted to fruit trees and zinfandel. They now farm six other varieties, besides zin, in Dry Creek Valley. They don't have a winery, but definitely have grape growing in the blood.