We appreciate your support. Please pass this issue on to your friends.
Houston, Texas
When I started in the wine business back in Houston, Texas—long before time was invented—the thought of a woman in wine was ridiculous. Everybody knew wine was the domain of old white guys like me.
Preferably rich old white guys.
It was well known that women’s brains weren’t cut out for stuff like thinking, ordering people around and making money. Or smoking cigars.
Especially cigars.
I’d like to point out to those of you who have not yet stuffed your laptop into the garbage disposal yet that this was not then, nor has it ever been, true.
But it’s what I was told. It is what the wine industry at the time believed all the way down to their clearly masculine barrel bottoms.
The first woman I ever saw in the wine business was a wine sales rep from a Mafia owned liquor distributor in New Jersey. I was taken aback when she walked into my store on Second Avenue in New York City. It was like gravity reversed itself and people suddenly started falling up.
For one thing, who knew the Mafia was at the cutting edge of women’s rights?
I couldn’t figure out why I reacted like that, which in the end was a good thing.
Awareness often begins with shock and confusion.
So here’s something you probably haven’t been thinking about:
Imagine a winemaker. What do they look like?
Take your time.
I’m guessing no one is saying, “A black woman.”
And yet…
I blame the English. They invented the wine business the way it is conducted today—which is different than it had been conducted for give or take the 6000 years before. By almost entirely other-than-white-people as it happens. Iranians, Chinese, Africans—men and women both.
Nary an old white guy in the bunch.
As much as I would like to trace the history of black winemakers in America, I have to get this in under the Google word count limit so I shall instead, direct your attention to one Iris Rideau.
Iris Rideau, owner, Rideau Winery
The first Black Woman in American history to own a winery.
Iris Rideau is still alive. She is roughly 86—birth records were sketchy for Louisiana Creoles in the ‘30’s. You can even visit the Rideau Winery in Santa Barbara near Solvang if you are so moved, although Iris sold the property in 2016.
Pick up an Ebelskiver while you’re in the area.
Her story is epic and I cannot begin to give her the credit and appreciation she deserves in this small space.
There are give or take, 11,000 wineries in the U.S. Less than 10% have a female winemaker. Only .004% are owned by women. Wineries owned by Black Women are even smaller than that.
It makes what Iris Rideau did even more amazing.
If you want to know more, check out the “Creoles to California Caravan”, or visit the website here: www.rideauvineyard.com.
https://www.thewinechef.com/blog/five-black-women-owned-wineries-to-support-now
The McBride Sisters Wine Company
I have talked about the difficulties of getting financing from banks for any winery (mine for instance) before. So now imagine you are a black woman, or in this case two, in front of what is almost certainly an old white guy banker.
Or an investor.
They should make a movie about it.
Robin and Andréa McBride, owners of California’s McBride Sisters winery, are two Black sisters who are doing just that. The winery, founded in the early 2000s, is now one of the largest Black-owned wineries in the U.S. Despite not always being taken seriously and often being met with skepticism, the McBrides realized their hard-earned success. “You have to have an extreme case of optimism and thick skin to be successful [as a woman of color] in this business.”
—from www.McBrideSisters.com
Extra Bonus Note:
I have never met the McBride sisters, but I like that they founded the SHE-CAN-Fund.
The McBride Sisters SHE CAN Fund invests in the professional advancement and career growth of high-potential, professional women, with a particular focus on women of color. Our mission is to close the gender and race gap in leadership positions in wine & spirits, hospitality, and finance industries by providing professional development scholarships to emerging women leaders.
Right now, only 10% of California’s 4,000+ wineries have female head winemakers, and women own only 4% of them. Among senior roles in hedge funds, venture capital, and private equity, women hold just 11%, 9%, and 6% of the positions, respectively. In the hospitality industry, only 12 percent of the leaders are women.
—from https://www.mcbridesisters.com/Our-Story/SHE-CAN
Theodora R. Lee, founder of Theophilus winery
https://www.theopolisvineyards.com/
Theophilus Winery
Some years ago I found myself sharing a table at a tasting of some repute which, much to my personal surprise, was being held outdoors. I didn’t think about taking a hat. I was unusually stupid in my youth.
It was the second worst sunburn I have ever had. It’s a wonder I lived.
But it stands out because I was sharing that table with Theodora R. Lee, a woman of some considerable presence and charm. She walked in with a huge folded hat and a swirl of a dress and everyone suddenly forgot I was there.
That was fine with me because I was standing behind a wine I didn’t really want to be associated with anyway. With her there, I didn’t have to lie as much.
She planted vines in a place no one else would have done on Hwy 128 in Mendocino County near the Sonoma County border in a rugged, elevated interior area. Her first vintage got a 94-96 rating from Robert Parker.
How is that even possible?
Who does that?
Who goes out in the middle of nowhere and says, “Oh yeah. This looks good. Let’s plant some grapes here.”
And then makes a Robert Parker 96 pt. wine on the first try?
Check it out at: https://www.theopolisvineyards.com/
Darjean Jones of Darjeanones Wines.
https://www.darjeanjoneswines.com/
Darjean Jones Wines
Darjean Jones started out as a plant pathologist at U.C Davis studying diseases of grapevines and her boutique family winery makes ( among other things) a Cabernet Franc from Stagecoach Vineyard and a Merlot from Broken Rock Vineyard up on Atlas Peak—two of the best in vineyards in Napa.
You can read about my own adventures with Stagecoach Vineyard in the Chapter on Atlas Peak in my book, The Secret Life of Wine, which is conveniently available for purchase on Amazon below.
Her story of course, is radically different from mine, and quite amazing.
As a Louisiana native, winery owner Darjean Jones says that the “love of good food and drink is coded in my DNA.” Jones, who has a PhD in plant pathology from UC Davis, sources her grapes (Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Chardonnay, and more) from coveted vineyards in Napa and Sonoma.
https://www.darjeanjoneswines.com/
Denise Roles Matthews and Kimberley T. Johnson, owners of the first winery in Maryland to be owned by Black Women.
https://philosophywinery.com/#winemaking
Philosophy Winery
Maryland was one of the earliest places to produce wine in the United States. The first known record of winemaking there is from 1648. In the mid 1940’s Phillip Wagner was the first winemaker to introduce French-American hybrids which saved us all from from drinking the Scuppernong and Delaware wines that were made for over 300 years from native American vines.
Now Denise Roles Mathews and Kimberley T. Johnson are making more Maryland wine history. And world wine history at the same time.
We produce small batch high quality dry wines. Our wines are crafted by Vintner Kimberly T. Johnson; exploring classic and native grape varietals sourced from vineyards in the Maryland area. We incorporate characteristics from the old world as well as new theories of winemaking utilizing french oak barrels and stainless steel fermentation vessels to create wines of unique depth and richness.
—from Philosophy Winery, https://philosophywinery.com
Not to Forget
Despite the space limitations I am working under, I would be totally remiss if I didn’t mention two other women pioneers in wine:
Ntsiki Biyela, winemaker and owner of Aslina Winery. She is the first black woman to own a winery in South Africa.
https://www.aslinawines.com/
Hannah Weinberger was not black, but she is the first recognized woman winemaker in California beginning in 1882. When her husband was shot dead by an unhappy employee her daughter had rejected, Hannah inherited the winery and kept it in production until prohibition closed her down in 1920.
https://www.winemag.com/2019/03/06/notable-first-women-in-wine-history/
The Last Word
I know the threats, humiliation, and both physical and emotional abuse that I went through in going from a good old Texas boy who didn’t drink to an owner in two wineries. Stories that really would chill your soul and selected highlights of the rest of you. And I’m an official old white guy—I fit the winery owner profile.
I mostly keep those stories to myself because they don’t serve to amplify the romantic notions of wine that make the industry worthwhile. And besides, there is real romance in wine too, which all in all, is a better place to put our attention anyway.
But I am literally not able to even begin to imagine what these women went through to get where they are and to produce the wines they produce.
They and others like them, are broadening the audience and awareness of wine in a way I could never do.
But somehow, these women did it.
They amazed others.
And they amazed themselves.
They might even make you want to go out and amaze yourself too.
Thanks,