Reichl - History in a glass: sixty years of wine writing from Gourmet

Gourmet was born into a nearly wineless world. It was 1941, and although America had not yet joined the war, crossing the ocean had become far too dangerous for any cargo so frivolous as wine. Before long, supplies of older French and German winesat the time, virtually the only wines being importedbegan to dry up. Even if the shipping lanes had remained open, there was little to import: The vineyards of Europe had turned into battlegrounds, and producing wine was no longer a priority.

It should have been a fine time for the American wine industry. But Prohibition was less than ten years behind us; most of the vineyards had been torn up, and replanting proceeded slowly. Reading Gourmets coverage, sixty-five years later, makes you realize what a precious window of opportunity this was. The fact that American winemakers wasted it makes you want to weep.

I dont say that lightly: Putting this book together turned out to be a remarkably emotional experience. Although I knew, intellectually, about the enormous changes that had taken place in the world of wine over the relatively short period since Gourmet began, reading these dispatches from the past gave me the opportunity to live right through them.

And so I found myself celebrating the repeal of Prohibition while listening to Frank Schoonmakerperhaps my favorite wine writer of all timeexcoriating American winegrowers for not doing a better job. When he is infuriated by the way American vintners insist on making endlessly mediocre copies of great French wines instead of drawing on their native strengths, Im angry too. Why not, he argues, produce good, drinkable American wines? From the vantage point of history, you cant help wondering how different things might have been had they taken his advice.

Then the war ends and all the wine writers hurry over to France to see if the vineyards are still intact. Theyre hoping that a few wily winemakers have managed to hide their bottles from the invading boches. We celebrate each time an unheralded stash is discovered, jubilant that the German occupiers have left some for us. Its a halcyon timegreat wine is still affordableand as Gourmets writers drink more than their share, were standing right there with them. Then James Beard is dispatched on a truly epic tour of France, inhaling, ingesting, and imbibing enough to feed a few small villages. Its quite a performancewhere did he get the stamina?but you cant help wishing that youd been at his side, matching him swallow for swallow.

When the fifties and sixties roll around, Americans broaden their wine horizons. As writers like Hugh Johnson, Frederick Wildman, Jr., and Lillian Langseth-Christensen head off to Austria, Spain, and Italy on assignment for the magazine, we find ourselves wandering through the vineyards enjoying a kind of simplicity that will never come again. We stand in the fields picking grapes, we eat in charming little inns, and we stroll through the Viennese countryside enjoying our first taste of new wine.

Theres wonderful history here too, forgotten lore like Americas long love affair with Madeira. There is passion as well, for the people who wrote about wine in those early years were a lonely lot, and they were eager to swell their ranks. Their mission was clear: They wanted all the Americans who were not wine drinkers (and they were legion) to discover what they were missing.

And finally we share the enormous excitement as Americans, at last, discover wine and the world starts to change. Gourmet watches wine come into the culture, and rejoices as the industry matures and prospers. We witness Italian wine, once despised as negligible stuff in straw-covered bottles, begin to get respect. Before long were paying attention to Australia, Spain, and Chile.

But this is much more than a long look backward. What makes History in a Glass so thrilling is that we are watching history as it happens. Americas appreciation for wine grows, and we get to join the action.

Gourmet was, from the very beginning, committed to covering wine. In the early days, few other publications had much interest in the subject, and every expert was eager to contribute. Over the years the magazine published thousands of pages on wine, written by the very best writers in the language at the top of their form.

I think they would be amazed at the way things have turned out. I like to imagine telling Frank Schoonmaker or Frederick Wildman that America has become a country of wine connoisseurs. Id like to be able to take them into one of our great wine stores and show them how impressive our native wines have become. But more than anything Id like to be able to raise a glass of something very, very good and thank them for their eloquence as I toast them for leading the way.

It could hardly be expected that a part of the United States which has had as fantastic and extraordinary a history as California, would be anything but extraordinary as far as the history of its viticulture is concerned. A state in which a Mexican general, born a Spaniard, received as his guest a Russian princess who had arrived in America by way of Siberia and Alaska, and protected this Russian princess from the amorous advances of an Indian chief, is no ordinary state. The treatment which the vine has received in California has been exactly as fantastic and as extraordinary as that story, and involves an even greater array of nationalities and events tragic and comic.