Los Angeles Wine: A History from the Mission Era to the Present

The county of Los Angeles has one million five hundred and ten thousand bearing vines, and eight hundred and seventy-five thousand which were not productive last year, while preparations are being made to plant a million cuttings this season. Our climate and soil appear to be congenial to the growth.

For several years we have shipped to San Francisco large amounts of grapes, but since the vineyards of the northern part of the State have begun to bear, the trade has diminished, although ours are superior. The advantage, however, of the northern fruit is, that it can be brought fresh to market every morning. Consequently, we must more generally convert our grapes into wine. According to the books of the great forwarding house of P. Banning, at San Pedro, the amount shipped to San Francisco, in 1857, was 21,000 boxes, averaging 45 pounds each, and 250,000 gallons of wine; in 1858, 19,000 boxes, averaging 42 pounds each, and 325,000 gallons; the wine having been manufactured in the years mentioned, and principally by three houses, as many of the owners of vineyards have neither the means nor knowledge requisite for this purpose. Of the quantity indicated,

Sainsevaine Brothers made……………………..120,000 gallons

Kohler & Frohling………………………………..80,000 “

Mr. Keller…………………………………………50,000 “

Scattering…………………………………………75,000 “

Although this amount may seem large, yet not more than half our grapes are thus manufactured. The natives dry and lose much of the fruit, for want of proper fences; a considerable portion is shipped in various directions, and the Indian consumption is extensive. A vine yard, well grown and kept, will yield an average of a gallon of strong wine to the vine, and some vineyards average 2 gallons. I have a vineyard fifty-five years old, which, although badly managed in former times, averages 2¼ gallons to a vine.

It is stated that the grape in cultivation is a variety introduced by the early Mission priests from San Carlos, in Catalonia, Spain, and first propagated from seed, which evidently had the effect of changing its quality, as well as adapting it to the climate and soil—yet other accounts assign it a different origin. Since then the invariable mode of propagation has been by cuttings, under the rudest and most careless culture, consisting of merely scratching over the surface with a wooden plough, sometimes laying off the ground in squares, with a distance of 2 varas [Spanish yards] between the vines, each way, or planting without line or row, making a hole 2½ feet down with a crow-bar. Yet, under such treatment, the memory of the oldest inhabitant does not recall a season in which the grape crop of Los Angeles was not abundant. No manure has ever been used, nor should any of a vegetable character be employed, when the object is to make good wine, except leaves and other parts of the vine itself, cut, dried, and returned to the soil.

Although Americans are now planting vineyards extensively, they follow the old system, only ploughing, and laying off better, not choosing to make innovations upon a mode that has been and is so successful. Doubtless, the manner of planting from nurseries, as practiced by the most intelligent vine-culturists of Europe, would be more economical and certain, where the vines remain two years in the nursery, and are transplanted in the third. The advantages would be, first, the use of the ground intended for the vineyard; secondly, the plants could be selected, so as to be all vigorous, and admitting of no failures, as in the case of cuttings; thirdly, in transplanting them, they could be set erect, thus rendering staking unnecessary—an item of great saving; fourth, the holes being larger, the roots would be better accommodated, and the loose soil, also, would constitute a great improvement on the crow-bar system; fifth, saving of labor in cultivating an extensive are of group for two years; sixth, young vines would not be allowed to bear in the third year, as desired by the old mode, but being transplanted at the period, would form a new series of roots, become more vigorous, and produce a larger crop in the fourth year. Bearing a crop the third year certainly debilitates them.

Los Angeles is situated in latitude 34° north, which is within the favored region natural to the vine, and accounts for the abundance and certainty of our crops, while the little labor we expend in its culture insures our profit. Had it been otherwise, with high rate of California wages, failure would be inevitable. Planting a new vineyard, with us, costs about $10 or $12 an acre. Similar work in Ohio, with the terracing and trellising necessary there, costs from $400 to $500. Our vines are placed 6 feet apart, each way, in squares, leaving lanes and margins. This gives 1,100 to the acre, when well grown, 1,100 gallons of wine. In Ohio, 2,420 vines to an acre produce on an average of from eight to ten years, 250 gallons. The best vineyards of Bordeaux furnish 126 gallons to an acre of nearly 3,000 vines. Thus it is evident that this section is adapted to the vine and to the manufacture of genuine wine, without factitious aids. We need capital to develop our capabilities. As yet, there has been no fair test of our wines, as we are in the beginning, and cannot afford to wait until they have age. We expose them for sale, regardless of reputation, a few months after they are made, and are satisfied that they find purchasers. But we are convinced that if California wines had the same age as many of foreign production, which command exorbitant prices, ours would far surpass them. The sparkling wine made by Sainsevaine Brothers, of this place, has been well received everywhere, although comparatively new.

The wild grape abounds in all parts of this county, and there appear to be three varieties—one a rambling kind, producing little or no fruit; another less rambling, but still raising itself from the ground some distance, and furnishing heavy crops of well shaped bunches, fruit large and thin-skinned, and juice saccharine with well developed vinous flavor; and a third, which climbs to the top of the tallest trees, bearing light bunches of small fruits. Old Californians assure me that they formerly made excellent wine from this second variety, resembling in flavor, color, and aroma, the clarets of Bordeaux. It is replete with coloring matter, and I have no doubt that, if properly tested, it will prove an invaluable acquisition to the State. Our cultivated grape has not equally good qualities for making wines of the red as of the white class; it is deficient in color.

It is also said that this variety of the wild grape produced better aguadiente (brandy) that the cultivated fruit, which, in Lower California, among the ruins of the Missions, is white and red, of the Malaga type, introduced by the Jesuits by way of Peru, and is part of superior quality both for wine and for the table. The greater part, however, is converted into raisins.

Various foreign grapes have been tried here, but none succeed so well as that now in cultivation. The famous Catawba and Isabeila have been experimented with for several years, and at last thrown into the road as useless. If we ever obtain a better variety, it must be from seeds. The great vineyards which were attached to the Missions of California, with few exceptions, are ruined and dead. That of San Gabriel, in this county, had two hundred thousand vines, of which remain but black stumps to mark the ruin. Let us have a railroad, and we will supply the Union with grapes and wine.

Most of our vineyard labor is done by the Indians, some of whom are the best pruners we have—an art they learned from the Mission Fathers.

The manufacture of wine, in a suitable climate, is simple, and may be done by any one of ordinary intelligence. But when the climate and soil are not adapted to the nature of the grape, then, indeed, it becomes a complicated art. One of the most essential things to be observed in its manufacture is the proper regulation of temperature, particularly during the phenomenon of the first fermentation; and to this the least attention is paid. If the must is too cool, the fermentation is slow and apt to sour, while, if there is too much heat, it will soon go into the acetous state. Must, which abounds in saccharine matter, and is deficient in ferment, requires a higher degree of temperature than that which has these substances in opposite proportions. The strongest must, even when it contains much ferment, can support a higher temperature than the weak, because the great quantity of alcohol which is developed, retards the action of the ferment, and prevents the tendency to pass to the acetous fermentation. The best general temperature is between 62° and 64°F. There is little difficulty in maintaining this temperature in a cellar, but it may be observed that the act of fermentation elevates the temperature. To arrive at that which is the most convenient, it is necessary to pay attention to the temperature of the grapes at the time of mashing them. If picked early in the morning, or at noon, it varies many degrees. To obviate this, they may be picked a day in advance, or they should be cooled in a large vat, and vice versa. The temperature of substances cast to the surface during fermentation is more elevated than the liquid which supports them, and if their contact with the air is prolonged, they experience alterations of another nature.

These few facts comprehend all that is necessary to make wine, but they are subject to many variations and much detail, like most other processes of manufacture.

The manner of making wine, in this county, is as follows: The grapes are deprived of their stems by hand; they are then mashed between wooden or iron rollers; some tread them out in the ancient style. A portion of the juice runs into a cooling vat, without pressing; the crushed grapes are put into a screw-press and forced out rapidly, all the result being must for white wine. As the grapes are black, and the coloring matter exists only in the skin, and requires in some degree the presence of alcohol to dissolve it, if the pressing be done quickly, the wine will be white; but if slowly, or if the grapes come broken from the vineyard, the must will show color; for, as soon as the fruit is broken, and the juice comes in contact with the air, fermentation commences, and simultaneous with it, the prescence of alcohol, in a greater or less degree, which extracts the coloring matter. The must is then transferred into the fermenting tuns, and the first active fermentation goes on, according to circumstances, for from four to ten days. The mashed grapes are put into vats to ferment, from which results red wine. This is, in part, distilled into brandy. Some persons distil red wine with the “marc” into brandy immediately after fermentation, but if left to pass a secondary fermentation, it would yield more alcohol.

The wine is racked off in January and February, again in March and April, and for the third time in September. It should be taken off the lees after the first fermentation subsides, when the wine has settled; for it cannot gain anything by being allowed to stand on the lees longer than is absolutely necessary.

The proportions of saccharine matter and ferment in our grapes are well balanced; therefore there is no extraordinary art in making wine; as it will make itself, with common care and without the addition of any extraneous substance. The purest and finest wines in the world are made from the juice of the grape alone.

More capital is needed to make property cellars, procure necessary materials, and to enable us to hold our wines till they have age, when they would compare favorable with the best. Another great want is a bottle manufactory, that we may store our wines, and prevent counterfeiting, which is now going on extensively.

A poor woman in the adjoining county of Santa Barbara has but one vine. It bore last year five thousand bunches of beautiful grapes weighing over a pound each, yielding her the handsome sum of $400. When a girl, and leaving Monterey to remove to her present home, she picked up a vine cutting to drive her mule. This cutting she planted upon her arrival, and, after the lapse of seventy years, such is the result.