The American politician Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) was born in Shadwell in the US state of Virginia, the son of a tobacco planter. As one of the champions of a free America, he formulated the first draft of the US Declaration of Independence. From 1785 to 1789, he was a US envoy in Paris and travelled for several months in France and Italy to study viticulture. Among other things, he visited vineyards in Bordeaux, Burgundy, the Rhône and Piedmont. In a letter, he wrote: "We could, in the United States, make as great a variety of wines as are made in Europe, not exactly of the same kinds, but doubtless as good. "
He subsequently developed into a true wine connoisseur and wine lover and remarked: "My measure is a perfectly sober 3 or 4 glasses at dinner". He wrote detailed descriptions of Bordeaux wines and rated the best châteaux, including Château Carbonnieux(Graves) and Château-Grillet(Rhône). His ranking was included in the 1855 Bordeaux Classification. He sent his friend and first US President George Washington (1732-1799) 30 bottles of Château d'Yquem, which he visited in 1787.
Jefferson's wine cellar
In 1801, he was elected the third US president and also won the next election in 1805. During this time, he built up an extensive wine cellar with mainly French cult wines such as the top wine estates Château Latour and Château Lafite-Rothschild. A bottle of the latter's 1787 vintage from his estate fetched a fantastic price at a Christie's auction in December 1985. The bottle, owned by the German collector of rare wines Hardy Rodenstock (1941-2018), was sold to the American publisher Malcolm Forbes (1919-1990) for £105,000 ($175,000).
In this context, there was a forgery affair that was never fully clarified. Another wine from Jefferson's estate was a Château Margaux 1787, which was offered for 500,000 dollars but never sold. This would have made it the most expensive wine in the world (see details there). Wine bottles from his former estate that are still available today usually bear the initials "Th:J" carved into the bottles (see bottles top right).
Winery Monticello/Virginia
Jefferson had great respect for agriculture and was intensively involved in viticulture on his Monticello estate in Virginia for over 30 years from 1770. He also had a moral motive, as he was convinced that the only way to prevent Americans from consuming stronger alcoholic beverages was through appropriate wine culture and sufficient quantities of wine. He wrote: "No nation is addicted to drink where wine is cheap. This is the only antidote to the deadly poison of whisky". This was supported by a law in 1791.
All alcoholic beverages were subject to an excise duty, with the exception of wine produced in America. He experimented time and again with imported cuttings from Europe and appointed Anthony Giannini (1747-1824), an Italian from Tuscany, as estate manager. He had immigrated with Philip Mazzei (1730-1816), who planted the first vineyards in Virginia with his neighbour Jefferson.
Experiments with grape varieties
But all attempts with European vines failed. They were all destroyed by phylloxera because it was not recognised as the cause for a long time. Later, Thomas Jefferson tried to accept the characteristics of American vines. He now trialled numerous indigenous grape varieties and encouraged many other winegrowers to do the same. In a letter in 1783, he wrote in detail about a wine made from the species Vitis vulpina. In another letter in 1817, he wrote very favourably about a wine produced from the American Scuppernong vine.
He was in regular correspondence with John Adlum (1759-1836), who was the first to cultivate the Catawba variety, and received a wine made from it from him in 1823. However, his dream of making the USA a top wine-growing nation was not realised throughout his life. For the history of US viticulture, see also USA and California.
Thomas Jefferson and bottles: Last Bottle
Monticello Estate: by Christopher Hollis, Own work, CC BY 2.5, Link
Statue: by User:Linksfuss, Monticello Virginia, CC BY-SA 3.0, Link
