This is a snapshot of the wine industry 100 years ago. Why the1920s? Prohibition took effect in 1920 making it illegal to manufacture, transport, or sell alcoholic beverages. It wasn't against the law to drink if you acquired it legally. You could make your own hooch.
1920 was a big year for the country as Women's Suffrage was also ratified, giving women the right to vote. One small step...
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| Winehaven Winery cellar building, Richmond, CA The largest winery in California in 1919 It later became a Navy fuel depot |
Just like that, the tap was turned off in January 1920. Before Prohibition, there were 256 wineries in Sonoma County, over 1,000 in California and 2,500 wineries in the entire country. When Prohibition ended in 1933 there were maybe a hundred still standing nationwide.
In 1960 California had 270 wineries, and it would take another 50 years to reach the pre-Prohibition level. Serious harm had been done to the industry and recovery was slow as it was interrupted by the Great Depression, World War II, then a lack of interest in wine until the late-1960s.
The wineries that made it through did it with sacramental wine for the church and wine for home winemaking. There were some illegal shenanigans going on, and occasionally a winery got caught. The history tour at Korbel Cellars contains a ledger book from that time. They sent a lot of grapes to "cousins" in Chicago. Coincidently, the Chicago Mafia was big in the bootlegging business.
Business boomed for grape growers. Beaulieu Vineyards in Napa famously planted more vineyards in 1923 to keep up with the demand from home winemaking.
The graph below shows the most popular white wine grapes planted in California in 1920. I haven't found one for reds. Caveats: (1) It's unknown how well the growers reported their crops to the state. (2) Grape vines were sometimes mislabeled.
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| click on graph to enlarge |
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