From Montebello To Paris Glory
The Montebello wine district has a rich history going back even before the First World War.
👋 Hello, I’m Kevin Ferguson, author of 🍷 Rain on the Monte Bello Ridge,🍷 my forthcoming memoir about health, aging and winemaking. (Read the book's origin story.) 🍇 The Centenarian Playbook is my newsletter, which features longevity tips and stories from Grandma Kay’s long life. It also includes stories of the Gemello Winery, which her late husband, Mario, ran for nearly half a century. 📖 I’m sure you’ll find my maternal grandparents are quite lovable characters. You can subscribe by clicking on this handy little button.
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From Montebello To Paris Glory
By the turn of the 20th Century, Pierre Klein had established one of the finest wineries in California. In 1888, he purchased 160 acres halfway up Montebello Road, a narrow street on this hilly coastal range in Cupertino twisting through hairpin turns as it ascends the mountain.
Around the same time, San Francisco physician Osea Perrone bought 180 acres near the top of the ridge and established his Montebello Vineyards and summer home.1
In 1900, Klein’s Mira Valle Cabernets won the gold medal at the Paris Exposition. He retired in 1910. Five years later, Great Grandpa John Gemello landed a job as a caretaker to the old Klein Estate.2
At Vidovich Vineyards: Following a March talk I gave about the Gemello history, the Gemello and Vidovich families pose with Mario Gemello’s widow, Grandma Kay, 102, seated.
John Gemello was fresh off previous employment at the Almaden Vineyards. There, he worked under Paul Masson, the famous French immigrant, who pioneered the making of sparkling wine in the Santa Cruz Mountains.
Gemello’s skills were in demand on Montebello Road. He soon moved on to another winery down the street, getting hired by the Picchetti family. Vincenzo Picchetti is the one who is credited for giving the Montebello hillside its name. Monte Bello is Italian for beautiful mountain. Vincenzo was born in the Italian town of Fomarco, on the Swiss border. He was influenced by his family of winemakers.
Vincenzo arrived in the Santa Clara Valley in 1872, and soon got hired by the Jesuits of Santa Clara College (now University) to be foreman of their summer retreat, called Villa Maria. It was located on Stevens Creek Road, where they made sacramental wine.
The Jesuits advised him to buy land in the area. He and his brother, Secondo, did so, building their own winery at the base of the Montebello Ridge.
In 1883, Vincenzo’s pregnant wife, Theresa, suffered a nasty fall chasing a cow out of her garden with a pitchfork. This resulted in the loss of her first born child. She would give birth to five more sons. Two of them, Antone and John, would hire my great grandfather to plant a vineyard just below the Picchetti Winery.3
In 1883, Vincenzo’s pregnant wife, Theresa, suffered a nasty fall chasing a cow out of her garden with a pitchfork.
Around 1917, Gemello partnered with two others running a small orchard and vineyard on the Montebello Ridge. Within one or two years, they earned $9,000 each,4 largely due to the high prices for fruit following the First World War. He would leave Montebello for Mountain View, where he would launch the Gemello Winery with his teenage son, Mario, in 1934, at the end of Prohibition.
Mario, my grandfather, would take over the day-to-day operations of the Gemello Winery in 1941, building the winery into a successful operation, producing over 65,000 gallons of wine per year by the 1950s.
One day in the mid 1950s, four engineers from the Stanford Research Institute came to visit Mario at the winery in Mountain View. Dr. Dave Bennion, Hew Crane, Charlie Rosen and Howard Ziedler, were considering purchasing a vineyard on the Montebello Ridge. It was just below the old Perrone Estate that got acquired by William Short in 1949. Mario was a former customer of Short, purchasing grapes for some of his wines.
The engineers outlined their plans about going into the wine business.
Mario gave them what many would consider discouraging advice. “I told them DON’T. Don’t go into the wine business,” he said, recounting how much hard work it requires.
"But that shows you how wrong I was,” Mario told a wine writer years later. “They made a success of it.”5
In fact, Mario became a customer, purchasing six tons of Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon grapes in 1959.
In 1969, Ridge hired Paul Draper as the head winemaker. He had grown up on a farm outside Chicago and graduated from Stanford University. More recently, he had been making wine in Chile.6
1976 Judgment of Paris
Ridge Wine took honorable mention in the 1976 Judgment of Paris. This is the famous blinddtasting that gave California instant recognition as a world-class region when a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon took first place beating its French counterparts. The winner: 1973 Stag's Leap Wine Cellars S.L.V.
The French tried to save face by saying, “Our wines will improve with time. But these California wines will not age well.”7
In 2002, many of the judges were stunned when California won again in a 25th Anniversary re-enactment of the Judgment of Paris. But first place this time didn't go to Napa. Instead, Silicon Valley’s Mountain View got the praise. My grandfather's 1970 Gemello Cabernet Sauvignon took first place. The Gemello Cab scored first place on 14 of 16 scorecards of the judges.
In 2006, Ridge Wine got its due at the 30th anniversary of the Judgement of Paris event. Two panels of wine judges evaluated the same 10 wines tasted in the 1976 Judgment contest. One panel came from Napa at Copia: The American Center for Wine, Food & the Arts. The other panel at wine merchant Berry Bros. & Rudd in London.
When the results were combined, Montebello Road got the props: the 1971 Ridge Monte Bello Cabernet Sauvignon took first place, a significant lesson in aging. That same 1971 Ridge Cab took fifth place in 1976.
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Sullivan, Charles. Like Modern Edens: Winegrowing in Santa Clara Valley and Santa Cruz Mountains 1798-1981. California History Center, 1982, p. 54.
The old Klein Estate is now the Jimsomare property.
DiVincenzi, John, “The Vincenzo Picchetti Family and Winery - A History,” Italian American Heritage Foundation newsletter, Vol 27, #7, July 2002
In 1919, $9,000 would translate into $161,000 in 2024, according to a CPI inflation calculator.
Sullivan, Charles, Wines and Winemakers of the Santa Cruz Mountains, D. R. Bennion Trust Fund, 1994
“Paul Draper of Ridge Vineyards to Retire,” New York Times, Asimov, Eric, June 28, 2016
“California Wines Beat The French -- Again,” SFGate.com, Murphy, Linda, May 25, 2006
Used to go quite often to Gemello's on the west side (actually south side) of El Camino in Mt. View in the 60s/70s.