Good Grape Wine Company

April 25 2006

The American Vine-Dresser’s Guide

From pages 8 - 9 of the Preface of the American Vine-Dresser’s Guide.  The first book published in North America on the cultivation of grapes and winemaking—published in 1826 and serialized at Goodgrape.com

… I then made the culture of the grape, ofits natural history, and of all that was connected with it, my most seriousstudy, to be the better able to succeed here. It is that resolution which mademe a vine dresser, although some may think I am not fit for it, being maimed inmy left arm. It was it, which made me lose several chances of getting rich, inmy journeying through America, because it had so completely absorbed all myother thoughts; and it was also that resolution, which made me accept a proposalof an association for the culture of the grape in Kentucky, under the sameprinciples of the one established at Phila­delphia, though not knowing,however, which of those so­cieties had been the first; but the KentuckyVineyard Society, may be with great propriety considered as the beginner, thetrue introducer of the cultivation of grape vines into the United States;although it proved to be a ruinous affair, both to the shareholders and theirvine dresser—nevertheless, millions will accrue to the country at large, fromthe school made there. Some of my rea­ders, who may, like me, have been losersin that under­taking, will see here with satisfaction, the reasons why it hasfailed, and how by a different management, it may now be a more profitableestablishment even than the United tates’ Bank. When I first came to Lexington,I was requested and encouraged, to make a trial on the cul­ture of the grape;but I was left with little courage by what I had seen done: They offered tohelp, and the following scheme of an association was agreed to: To sub­scribe200 shares, at $50 each—40 of the shares were to be mine as my salary toconduct the business, until it would become productive; after that, I was tohave $1000 per year out of the produce, and nothing, if there should benone,—-so that the subscribers put their money, and I my time, at stake. The produce of the 160 shares, was to beappropriated as follows:

Theplan was well laid, if we had perfected it; but in 1799 too anxious to begin,we went into business before all the 1160 shares were subscribed for, and whilethere was but very little money collected—five acres were planted with 35different species of the best grapes, a great part was obtained by purchasefrom Mr. Legau, at Spring Mill, near Philadelphia, and others gathered in thegardens of New York, a small part bought at Baltimore from a Ger­mannursery-man, and another small part brought directly from my own vineyards inSwitzerland, when my brothers came over to join me; three years we were in fullex­pectation, and worked with great courage—a great many species of vinesshowed fruit the third year; one vine of the sweet water was full of eminentlygood grapes, fully ripened by the first of September. A few bunches that Icarried to Lexington, were admired beyond any thing. But alas, it was the firstand last year that that vine ever bore fruit, a sickness (of which I shall makethe subject of a chapter) took hold of all our vines except the few stocks of Capeand Madeira grapes, from each of which we made the fourth year some wine, whichwas drank by the Shareholders in Lexington in March next. The fail­ure of thefirst plantation caused a relaxation among …

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Business models don’t change.  For a recent example of investors in a virtual vineyard/winery operation, check out this story.

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