For the half-century of its modern life, most people have commonly referred to the magnificent, mammoth stone wine structure just north of St Helena in Napa Valley as Christian Bros Wine & Champagne Cellars. Historians readily call it by its birth name, Greystone. The years in between were busy years. Within a decade of its completion in 1889 by Bourn & Wise Wine Co, Greystone began its succession of property owners. In 1894 Charles Carpy, a Napa Valley wine pioneer and power in the industry, acquired it. When Carpy became a founding member of the giant California Wine Association that year, so did Greystone. The immense facility became the icon for the enterprising C.W.A. for three decades. Four years into Prohibition in 1924, the C.W.A. had judiciously removed all of the 200,000 gallons of wine stored at Greystone. A year later, the Bisceglia Bros. of San Jose purchased Greystone, where they produced sacramental wines until 1930. Following a three-year hiatus, the Bisceglias restored operations at Greystone in late 1933. During that inactive period, ownership was transferred to California Vineyards Co., who sold the facility back to Bisceglia at the end of 1932; following Repeal, Central California Wineries owned it for a couple of years before selling it to Schenley in 1942. Christian Bros entered the picture in 1945 when they leased the cellar. Five years later, they purchased Greystone and saw forty-one more vintages before selling to the Heublein Wine Group in 1991. It did not take Heublein more than a year to find a buyer and the current resident, the Culinary Institute of America. We heartily bid them a long life at storied Greystone. — Timeline excerpted from Carl Wehr, Twenty Years at the Helm: A Story of Greystone, c1980.
Beautifully located with historic Beringer Bros Winery (est 1876) its neighbor on the south toward St Helena, and pioneer winery Charles Krug (est 1861) directly across the main road, Greystone was conceived by William Bourn – Napa Valley vineyard owner and rancher, financier, and developer of the Empire Gold Mine (now a historic park) – as a huge storage cellar for aging Napa Valley wines before sending them to market as a quality product. Set imposingly against the western hillside, the structure was hailed as the finest example of 19th-century winery architecture and advertised as the “largest wine cellar in the world.” From its earliest days, Greystone, its cellars, and its stone arch gateway have been popular subjects of a bountiful crop of postcards. Today, all pre-Prohibition Greystone postcards are dear and very rare, while special favorites are those scarcities with postmark dates and wine-y messages.
Graystone 1905 – An Early View
One October day in 1905, a black & white photo postcard of Greystone was mailed, exclaiming in the tiniest writing, “This is the swellest winery in the state. Too bad you’re not here to help me drink all the wine they have…” This gem is the earliest dated postcard in my Greystone/Christian Bros collection of almost 140 cards. Although no such postcards have been seen, I like to think that Elite Studio, the local and well-established publisher of this early view, could have been in business in 1888-1889 and documented the actual construction of the massive building (we pardon proprietor & photographer H. Blakesly for the misspelling).
California Wine Association Winery, St Helena, 1907
In 1894 seven of the State’s largest and most powerful wine firms incorporated as the California Wine Association. Headquartered in San Francisco, this giant organization came to control 84% of all pre- Prohibition wine and owned vineyards and wine cellars in every major wine-producing area of the State. By the early 1900s, Greystone was one of nearly eighty of the State’s largest wine facilities under C.W.A. control. Almost all of the wineries retained their names and kept their autonomy. The C.W.A. owned Greystone from 1894 until Prohibition in 1925, when they sold it to Bisceglia Bros. This postmarked 1907 exceptional color card is the only Greystone postcard seen captioned with the California Wine Association Winery name. All others, it is Greystone.
Greystone Winery, Aka California Wine Assn Winery, 1908
Besides being beautiful, this card is historically valuable because of the white letters. The printed caption reads Greystone, but clearly visible on the front slope are the finely tended letters of “Association” — as in California Wine Association. The time period these identifying letters boldly spelled out the C.W.A. name is not known to me, and only one other card in the collection shows them, faintly and undated. It would be fun to know the dates. In 1908 Mrs Scott wrote on the back of this very card: “There are hundreds of acres of grapes, and many wineries, but this building is the largest and finest of all. The picture doesn’t do it justice. Is built of Gray Stone.” She probably knows.
Bisceglia Bros Wines at Greystone, c1936
Bisceglia Bros Wine Corp owned historic Greystone during the years 1925–1930 / 1932–1938 and was proud to state their wines were “Cellarized at World Famous Greystone Cellars in Napa Valley.” (Cellarized?) The old established firm, founded in 1880 near San Jose, later added several large bulk wine facilities in the Central Valley and operated two huge facilities in the Santa Clara Valley. In c1937, Bisceglia produced a “helpful little booklet all about wine dedicated to a new generation of wine lovers,” and noted Greystone’s immense size — three stories high, 400′ long, and 78′ wide, with a total floor space of just under 3 acres and over a dozen tunnels excavated into the hillside, all providing an amazing capacity of over 4 million gallons of wine — a welcome addition to the enterprising venture. The booklet also has illustrations of their wine cellars at San Jose, Evergreen, and this postcard view of Greystone.
California Vineyards Co.— The “Graystone Winery”
An interesting card. A bit murky, actually. In 1931, during Prohibition’s Dry years, Bisceglia Bros sold “Graystone” to California Vineyards Co. “with Offices in all principal cities in the USA.” In December 1932, CVC sold the facility back to Bisceglia for $10,000 at public auction. Throughout their short-lived ownership, California Vineyards Co. issued a number of mailer postcards announcing they had “acquired this World’s Largest Winery” located in St Helena, modeled after the Chateau De Quincie of France. Researching this fact unknown to me, I found the commune of Quinciè-en-Beajolais, but no Ch. De Quincie. That’s OK. I am not sure what this wine company is about. Nonetheless, it enjoyed a Greystone life of two years.
Goland [GoLan] Winery At Greystone, c1940–1942
Although with a wrong – or misspelled – caption, this extremely rare real-photo postcard introduces us to another little known Greystone life. The name Golan, a label of Central California Wineries Inc, was established in 1940 when the super cooperative, backed by the Bank of America, purchased Greystone from Bisceglia hoping to launch a national brand. Wine industry sales and advertising executive Louis Golan introduced two lines in this effort, GoLan and LaNgo (shy guy). He initiated a full-page color magazine advertising campaign and hired “a bundle of beauty” to be the “Lango Sunshine Girl.” (Trust me — I have a few ads from 1941.) For whatever reasons GoLan Wines was not successful, leading to the sale of Greystone to Schenley in late 1942. A personal note: before we leave this postcard story, stop for a minute and imagine taking a historic drive through the magnificent stone arch gateway constructed in 1889. It is right there. P.S. Thank you, James Lapsley (UCD historian, author, instructor specializing in the economics of wine) for your much welcomed 1996 masterpiece, Bottled Poetry : Napa Valley Wine from Prohibition to the Modern Era, Without, the story of Golan Winery, and this postcard, would still be a mystery.
Cresta Blanca Wine Co. — Greystone Cellar, 1940s
Interestingly, out of over 100 postcard images of Greystone, this 1940s photo postcard is the only one that shows Hwy 29, the main north-south artery of Napa Valley from Napa to Calistoga, with wineries and vineyards along each side. Thankfully, except for a small patch of freeway at the Napa end, it is still a two-lane wine country roadway. The sign visible on the right, straddling the signature stone wall along Hiway 29 in front of Greystone, identifies Cresta Blanca Wine Co. The pioneer winery was founded in Livermore Valley in 1882 by Charles Wetmore, considered a “mythic figure in the history of wine in California” by wine historian Chas Sullivan. The name Cresta Blanca describes the prominent white-topped limestone cliff that stands above the rolling 500-acre vineyard. In 1892, Wetmore-Bowen (brother Clarence Wetmore & Chas Bowen, SF businessman) took the reins of Cresta Blanca and continued the production of highly acclaimed wines until Prohibition. When Central California Wineries sold Greystone Cellar to Schenley in 1942, they made it the production facility of Cresta Blanca Wines, acquired the year before. For the remainder of the decade, Greystone was a crushing and fermenting site, with the raw wine shipped elsewhere for finishing and bottling. We will explore the Cresta Blanca Livermore Valley wine country postcard story in the near future.
Christian Brothers Cellars, c1950
With their acquisition of the 60-year old wine cellar in 1950, Greystone became Christian Brothers. A vigorous program of rehabilitation and modernization was undertaken, including champagne & sparkling wine production facilities, a tasting room & lounge, and a 90-car paved parking lot for visitors. Winery tours, followed by a tasting, began in 1955. Although a steady increase was seen, tourist traffic at Christian Bros in the mid-1950s was light, maybe 10 or 12 per day, a few more on the weekends. Incredibly, not a decade later, the postcards tell us over 100,00 visitors arrived each year. This vintage photoview is a favorite, recalling the earlier days of Christian Bros. before the front vineyard was replaced with a parking lot. Remember the song? “They paved paradise and put up a parking lot…”
Christian Bros Champagne & Wine Cellars, 1980s
This 1980s view of the magnificent Napa Valley winery is the awesome sight that comes to mind for later-day visitors. Obviously very touristy-looking, nevertheless majestic and welcoming. “This big wine cellar is built like a Rhine castle … have you seen it?” In the left foreground, we can also see a small portion of the original ivy-covered stone archway entrance that has always had a magical presence, although it is no longer used today. The tour buses parked in front of the winery bring forth one of my Very Favorite postcard messages, penned in the 1970s on a Christian Bros postcard: “Today we took a Gray Line Tour to Napa Valley Wine country in Sonoma County.” Really?!, I say.
Christian Brothers Tasting Room, c1970
With our fantastic winery tour concluded, let’s relax in the Christian Bros. just-finished 1955 tasting room and recall a wee bit of history. The Christian Brothers teaching order of laymen actually entered the California wine industry in 1879 in the east Bay community of Martinez when they purchased 70 acres for the site of their Novitiate & Normal School. As some of this property had previously been planted into an orchard and vineyard, the Brothers continued to cultivate the land and built a winery to crush the crop from their vineyard, which had grown to 35 acres by 1890. Alas, the town also continued to grow and ultimately forced the Brothers’ move in 1931 to the old Gier Winery estate on Mt. Veeder in Napa Valley and establish their Mont La Salle Monastery & Vineyard. Here, amongst 165 acres of forest and 180 acres of vineyard and a fine winery, the Christian Bros. prospered. In 1950 they purchased the huge, castle-like Greystone Wine Cellar in the valley below. We know the rest of the story: a monumental Greystone life.