Author: Gail Unzelman

Directly in the middle of the vast Central Valley is the San Joaquin Valley, a viticultural wonderland for growing and the production of raisins, or dried grapes. Today, on almost 100,000 acres in an area within a 60-mile radius of Fresno, raisin growers produce 100% of the U.S. raisins. Our postcard story is set here in Fresno — a major city and economic hub in the San Joaquin Valley, the largest city in the greater Central Valley, and “The Raisin Capital of the World.” Many of the following accounts of our postcard storytellers are borrowed from the 1891 published jewel, California Homes & Industries. Fresno Illustrated.

Arriving in California in 1852 from his home state of New York, Leland Stanford (1824–1893) was an attorney, storekeeper, Justice of the Peace, organizer of the Sacramento Library Association, industrialist, and philanthropist.
He established a major University, was a Republican Party politician, 8th Governor of California, one of the “Big Four” who built the transcontinental railroad, and U. S. Senator from 1885 until his death in 1893. He also founded three California wineries.

Since the 1850s, a myriad of irrigation canals, or ditches to the farmers, have been vital to agrarian pursuits in the many thousands of acres of diverse agricultural richness of California’s Great Central Valley — whether cotton fields, olive orchards, fruit trees, grains & rice, or vineyards.

Welcome to our first Wine Country Story of the New Year where we visit one of the most exciting promotional campaigns in the history of the California wine industry. It is called National Wine Week, and beautiful artistic Poster Stamps are the stars of the story.

Life’s trials do make us grieve and pine, Yet one transcends the rule —
When honest drinkers test honest wine In cellars deep and cool.
When from the spout it runs like gold Our pulses leap and rise.
We praise the vintage pure and old And crown it with a prize.