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222 THE ESTABLISHMENT OF AN INDUSTRY 18505 and i86os some thirty-seven books, at least, on winegrowing were published in this country. The figure more than triples the output of the preceding fifty years, and the information in many of these books—not all, but many—was fuller and more accurate than it could have been earlier. They include Robert Buchanan's A Treatise on Grape Culture in Vineyards, in the Vicinity of Cincinnati (1850), a modest, but intelligent, brief work; the works of Husmann and Muench based on their experience in Missouri; Agoston Haraszthy's contribution from California, Grape Culture , Wines, and Wine-Making (1862); and, in the South, Achille de Caradeuc's Grape Culture and Winemaking in theSouth (1858). By the end of the Civil War, a man who wanted to collect a technical library on winegrowing in America could do so. How good was the technology? That, too, is a question better deferred till later, when the revolutions brought about by Pasteur's studies and by the crises of disease in Europe can be discussed. By way of brief summary, however, it may be said here that at the end of the Civil War there was an impressive accumulation of knowledge about the habits and requirements of the native vine, and there was beginning to be, at least, some experience in knowing how to handle it for wine. The study of individual varieties had been carried pretty far, both in the vineyard and in the chemist's laboratory, and new methods of training had been devised to suit the vigorous habits of the native vines.54 The techniques of hybridizing were well understood. Control of disease was still at a primitive stage, but that was about to change. The crucial importance of climate to winegrowing had been clearly grasped, and the Patent Office was publishing a detailed series of studies of climatological regions. If none of these things had passed beyond the beginnings, they were at least well begun. The Grape Boom in the Old South The main movements in eastern American winegrowing before the Civil War—main in the sense that they led to a continuing industry—were in New York State, northern Ohio, and Missouri. It would be quite wrong, however, to neglect the scattered but frequent efforts at winegrowing throughout the old South. We have seen how, in New York, Ohio, and Missouri, winegrowing not only continued but made considerable advances in size and prosperity throughout the war. In the South, however, it was severely cut back, and it is therefore of some historical interest to see just how widespread interest in it was before Fort Sumter stopped all that. In Virginia, home of the oldest of all winegrowing traditions in this country, the record is meager. There was evidently a good deal of farm-scale winemaking from native grapes, but nothing more. Perhaps the state's best contribution was the Norton grape, which became so important in the vineyards of Missouri; there is some evidence that commercial plantings of Norton were made in Virginia too before the war, around Charlottesville.55 EASTERN VITICULTURE COMES OF AGE 223 Scuppernong wine continued to flourish as the vin depays of North Carolina. Its most energetic sponsor was a Yankee named Sidney Weller, a graduate of Union College in New York State, who took over a worn-out farm of some three hundred acres at Brinckleyville, Halifax County, in the late 18208 and began to carry out his progressive ideas on agriculture.56 In addition to general farming, he went in for winegrowing, based largely on the Scuppernong but including the Norton and a labrusca called Halifax as well.57 Weller was a good promoter, who filled the agricultural press with accounts of what.he called his "American system"of viticulture:this was, in substance, simply to allow his Scuppernong vines unchecked growth on trellises instead of controlling them by any system of pruning: such freedom, presumably , could only be called "American."58 From grapes grown in this liberated fashion on some twelve acres of vineyard (the largest in the South, Weller thought), he produced several thousands ofgallons yearly of scuppernong "hock"and "champagne ," which he was able to sell at prices from $i to $6 a gallon to markets as distant as New York, New Orleans, and St. Louis.59 He also made his vineyards a place of publicresort, charging admission to picnickers and so adding measurably to the land's revenue. In the hands of...

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