New-York tribune., 1901-06-23
A BIT OF FRANCE NEAR By
CIENT WINE CELLAR, AND
THEIR STORY.
THEIR STORY.

"A
grapevine, with massive trunk, black and
Wrinkled by age yet full of life and vgor and |
Eow tiossoming for its sixtieth annual bountful
fTuitaGe There other black. gnarled and |
twisted vines the same hillside. some of which /
came into bearing perhaps fifty years ago, but
u ne aged this hale and vigorous father of
the vineyard. Fronting the vineyard ana /
TIE slope. much of its rude exterior hidden by /
cl.neing cf ivy. stands stone building /
of quaint design and structure suggesting by /
is architectural lines and angles old
chapel OF the Norman days. save that it has not
the added charm of ruin.
when that OLD grapevine was first rooted |
in the stony soil that is yet its home and tha |
irnl ressive pile OF rough cobblestone reared, !
that fair valley still bore plainly many relics |
and palpable reminders of the army of Wash |
irgton. which had Lain long there and there
about. guarding the important passes of the
Hudson and the Ramapo-for breastworks were
Fill to be seen. and the sites of camps al |
they had been left when the war was
and a-plenty still lived in the valley |
who bered well those stirring times and |
who had borne brave part in them many a
lloody held-as the mossy gravestones in any of
tie old busring grounds in the valley amply and |
,!Oquently testify to-day. The vine had been |
mere than ten years in bearing when the first |
locomotive whistle heard in the valley fifty |
years ago. and great and casks of wine |
that had been pressed from its fruit and that of
lis fellows in tire vineyard lay stored in the
cool. deep vaults that had been tunnelled and
:rchcd beneath the quaint stone building the |
hillside
IN lssG French immigrant came 20 America |
Gith his wife and two children To seek his fort |
une. lie Was vintyardist and winemaker. He |
brought with him numerous cuttings from vines |
in France. hoping TO find somewhere in this !
country climate and soil congenial them. tina
u might transplant them here and enjoy the |
harvest of their fruitace. lie travelled W the |
Hudson River from Ncw-York. and. attracted |
Ly the appearance Of the hills and valleys that
stretched away westward from the river and the
highlands. he sought among them Tor the condi- |
t.ocs required \ few miles back from the river. |
l. the most picturesque of those valleya. he
,oUEd sunny slope nearly the counterpart
cf o.e he had known at ms OLD home that he
purchase1 Land upon i. settled there with his
family and planted the cuttings h had
brough! from The sunny slope in France With
the planting Of the vineyard he began exCavat- |
ing the hillside for the building h. was To
erect part of hs plan. and tunnelirg for
vaults beneath it. From the cobblestones that
'@me plentifuIiy into sight as the ground was
,-cavated and tunne!ed he reared the quaint !
~ cs-val looking structure whose rude lines and
ivy clad walls to-day curiosity in the tour
Isl as ne secs them from the cars III passing. 7
ard the fun significance and import of whose /
existence, contemporary with that OF tbs gnnrlci
yin. near by Go not appear even 10 those who !
have lived all their lives almost in its shadow.
The French immigrants vineyard grew and /
tariVed. In 1879 il bore its crop This was
made into wine. The wine stored in the
Yaulted Tunnels beneath the stone building Y ar /
Icy year the vineyard Increased In acreage
ana The vintage in the cellar Increased in pro-
portion. The cream Of the French immigrant
more than realized. Hc had made profit
His the first succ, ssful venture OF the KIM
The Swiss colony in Indiana had attempted II a
generation teiore. had failed. and its vineyards
uprooted. The Germa, winemakcra on
for their product. and had ceased in their ef-
forts. The Ohio Catawha wine did not appear
until decade after the French immigrant had
established successfully his isolated wine cellar
IL the sunny New-York valley, and not for a
more years later did the earliest othc-
successful ventures in the making of Am 1
wines have their beginning. Thus that quaint
stone building ard the gnarled and twisted oil!
grapevine, still vigorous \ the buildings
shadow, stand for much than the mere
story of their age and quaintness implies. They
embody in themselves the very foundation of q
great American industry-the birth of an idea
which in its growth has made glad what would