Agoston Haraszthy de Mokesa (1812-1869), a nobleman from Austria-Hungary, is considered a Californian winegrowing pioneer. At the time of the Habsburg monarchy, he joined the imperial guard in the capital Vienna at the age of 18 and rose to the rank of colonel. On his estate in Hungary he was engaged in viticulture and silkworm breeding. In 1840 he emigrated to America and later brought his family with him. In Wisconsin he planted the first vineyard in this US state and founded a town named after him, today's Sauk City. He also operated a steamboat on the Mississippi. The news of the gold discoveries attracted him, as so many did at that time, to San Diego in California in 1849. Here he engaged in land speculation and a year later became the city's first sheriff. He also engaged in fruit, vegetable and grain farming, and ran a livery stable and a butcher shop.
In 1857, he bought 230 acres of land near the town of Sonoma and founded the Buena Vista Winery, which still exists. Using 165 grape varieties imported from Europe, he now began to grow grapes on a large scale. According to a claim made by his son Arpad Haraszthy in 1885, this allegedly included the Zinfandel variety, but this has since been proven to be probably false. On his property, he had six cellars driven into the sandstone hills. One year later, Jacob Gundlach (1818-1894), a German friend of Haraszthy's, founded the winery in the immediate vicinity, which was reactivated in 1973 as Gundlach-Bundschu. Haraszthy also met the Californian winegrowing pioneer of German descent Charles Krug (1825-1892) and persuaded him to grow grapes in Napa Valley.
Haraszthy was very successful and won several prizes with his wines. In 1861, on behalf of the Californian governor, he visited the wine-growing centres of the time in Germany, Spain, Italy, France and Switzerland and, on his return, wrote the comprehensive report "Grape Culture, Wines and Wine-Making". A year later, 100,000 European cuttings of 300 different grape varieties selected by him during his journey arrived. As a juicy detail, it should be mentioned that the Californian Senate refused to reimburse him for the travel costs. Haraszthy was the first to introduce European quality grape varieties to America on such a large scale and to begin experimenting with them on a grand scale.
He distributed them all over California and tried to find out the best vine for the different soils and climatic conditions. This was a major impetus for viticulture in California and many varieties grown today have their origins in this action. In just seven years, he expanded Buena Vista to 2,500 hectares. When he went bankrupt with his winery, Haraszthy emigrated to Nicaragua and tried his luck with sugar cane cultivation and rum production. But he could no longer experience success, because shortly afterwards he was allegedly eaten by alligators. A number of dubious legends arose, but his great merit for Californian viticulture is undisputed.
Haraszthy: By Unknown, Public domain, Link
Buena Vista: By Haraszthy, Agoston, 1812-1869 - flickr, Link
