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Famend for Judgment of Paris Win and Lifelong Philanthropy
NAPA, Calif., June 9, 2024 —Warren Winiarski, co-founder together with his spouse Barbara of the famed Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, handed away June 7, 2024, as he was making ready for his sixtieth harvest within the Napa Valley. He died, peacefully at house, on the age of 95. He’s survived by his three kids, Kasia Winiarski-Amparano, Stephen Winiarski, and Julia Winiarski, in addition to six grandchildren: Gabriel and Noah Amparano; Matin, Arren, Kiann and Maia Winiarski.
Winiarski was born in Chicago in 1928 and grew up in its close-knit Polish group. Though the identify Winiarski is a by-product of “winemaker” in Polish, Winiarski didn’t develop up planning to be one. His curiosity within the humanities led him to attend St. John’s School in Annapolis, Maryland, the place he met his late spouse, Barbara, a painter. He studied the western classics curriculum there and graduated Class of 1952.
Winiarski returned to Chicago and taught as a Lecturer within the Liberal Arts on the College of Chicago whereas finishing his grasp’s diploma in political science and dealing towards a doctorate. His research on Niccolo Machiavelli took him to Italy the place he was uncovered to a life-style that features wine with every day meals. He grew to become preoccupied with the concept of constructing wine and approached the topic with attribute scholarly rigor – studying all the things he might discover on the topic and searching for out educated mentors. In 1962, he graduated from the College of Chicago with a Grasp of Arts diploma from the Social Sciences Division (John U. Nef Committee on Social Thought division) with a specialty in Social Thought.
His profession trajectory modified dramatically after a visiting good friend introduced the Winiarskis a bottle of wine from an East Coast vineyard. At that luncheon Winiarski had an epiphany—not as a result of the wine was the most effective he had ever tasted, however as a result of it appeared to disclose to him the particular character of all wine. Quickly after, the couple started exploring the concept of transferring to the Napa Valley to hitch a burgeoning renaissance in California winemaking.
In 1964, the household drove to the Napa Valley the place Lee Stewart took Winiarski on as his sole apprentice at Souverain Cellars. Because the second man in a two-man operation, Winiarski stated he “spent his days working over wine vats and his nights poring over books about winemaking”. The next yr, he and Barbara purchased a small plot of land on Howell Mountain. They planted Cabernet Sauvignon vines on their small plot of land, although that selection had by no means been beforehand planted at such an elevation. Later, Howell Mountain gained notoriety for its Cabernet Sauvignon wines.
In 1966, whereas Robert Mondavi’s son Michael was serving within the army reserve, Robert tapped Winiarski for Assistant Winemaker on the new Robert Mondavi Vineyard. After working for Robert for 2 years, in 1968 he went on to assist a Denver dentist named Gerald Ivancie supply California grapes, which have been then shipped to Colorado, the place he and Ivancie produced the primary Vitis vinifera wines in that state. At present, Winiarski and Ivancie’s winemaking legacy continues by Colorado Mesa College’s Winiarski-Ivancie Viticulture and Enology Institute in Palisade – to date, the one V&E program within the state.
A go to to Nathan Fay’s house in Napa’s Stag’s Leap space to debate an irrigation method Fay had devised as soon as once more proved to be a fateful second for Winiarski. After tasting Fay’s home made Cabernet Sauvignon wine at that assembly, Winiarski described it as “a revelation”. It satisfied him that the Stag’s Leap space was the place the place “classical model” wines could possibly be made and maybe materialize Thomas Jefferson’s prediction that America would in the future make wines “probably pretty much as good” as any in Europe.
In 1970, Winiarski and a number of other traders purchased a 44-acre prune orchard not removed from Nathan Fay’s winery and replanted it to Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot vines. They named their new land, Stag’s Leap Winery, recognized at present as S.L.V. In 1972, the household and a gaggle of companions—some new, some from the winery partnership—purchased a second parcel close by as a vineyard website and Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars opened its doorways in 1973.
Winiarski was a crusader for wine high quality, showing ceaselessly in symposia all over the world and publishing articles in a number of wine journals. Preservation and philanthropy have been additionally extraordinarily necessary to each Winiarski and his household for over 50 years. Through the Winiarskis early years within the Napa Valley, they have been amongst these advocating for the then-radical notion of making an Agricultural Protect to guard the Valley from the suburban sprawl that was quick eliminating farmland in most different Northern California counties. The primary of its variety laws, Napa Valley Agricultural Protect, grew to become Napa County legislation in 1968. Winiarski continued to advocate politically for preserving the Valley’s rural magnificence, backing Measure J in 1990, its extension Measure P in 2008, Measure I in 2006, Measure Z in 2017, and Measure C in 2018. Since 1990, the Winiarskis have donated practically 200 acres, together with S.L.V. and their Arcadia Winery, to the Land Belief of Napa County, thus defending these lands from improvement in perpetuity.
In 1996, Warren and Barbara Winiarski initiated and offered beneficiant help for an oral historical past and
documentation for the Smithsonian Nationwide Museum of American Historical past’s ‘American Meals & Wine Historical past Challenge.’ The mission centered on meals and wine historical past as a lens for understanding American historical past and tracing the lengthy and numerous historical past of wine in america. This was the start of a protracted relationship Winiarski maintained with the Smithsonian selling wine as meals on the American desk, culminating with a Winiarski Household Basis grant funding a everlasting Meals and Wine Curator place.
The Winiarskis by no means forgot their St. John’s School alma mater. For 20 years Winiarski shared his love of literature and the classics with members from all over the world by main programs within the St. John’s School Summer time Classics program at its Santa Fe campus. Additionally they made beneficiant donations to make sure the continuation of the varsity’s distinctive curriculum, in addition to funding for tuition and campus infrastructure tasks.
For his international efforts to showcase and protect the standard and historical past of California wine, Winiarski was inducted into the California Corridor of Fame by Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. in 2017.
Winiarski’s mission to keep up wine as a part of American tradition was cemented when he donated $3.3 million in 2018 to construct the world’s most complete assortment of wine writers’ works on the earth on the College of California, Davis library. In 2024 Winiarski created the Spurrier-Winiarski Wine Author-in-Residence Award granting a recipient $50,000 for a three-month residency on the College of California, Davis, together with a $20,000 prize to help publication by the late Spurrier’s Académie du Vin Library.
In 2019, the Smithsonian Museum of American Historical past acknowledged his contributions to American winemaking and the museum’s American Meals & Wine Historical past Challenge by awarding him the James Smithson Bicentennial Medal. Different recipients embrace Stephen Hawking and Sir Edmund Hillary.
The Winiarski Household Basis has additionally supported many giant and small native Napa Valley organizations. NEWS (Napa Emergency Ladies’s Providers) and Samaritan Household Shelter have been each causes strongly supported by Barbara, personally. The Winiarski Household Basis additionally offered $5.1 million to Windfall Queen of the Valley Medical Middle in 2021 which funded the Barbara Winiarski Stroke and Diagnostics Middle, a 208-bed acute-care facility in Napa.
In 2022 Winiarski obtained the College of California, Davis, Distinguished Pal of the College Award for his contributions to scientific analysis and preserving the historical past of California’s wine business. One of the necessary analysis commitments is the Warren Winiarski Fund for Advancing the Amerine-Winkler Index. This analysis will assist current and future winegrowers and vintners meet the challenges of local weather change.
In 2024 The Julia Youngster Basis for Gastronomy and the Culinary Arts bestowed Winiarski with the Basis’s inaugural Trustee Medal of Honor in recognition of a lifetime creating long-lasting change on the earth of American meals and wine.
Winiarski bought Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars in 2007 however continued to develop grapes at Arcadia Winery within the Coombsville AVA, till his demise. The Winiarski Household Basis has generously funded the preservation of wine historical past throughout America, as effectively supported many native Napa Valley causes. The Winiarskis have been main supporters and donors to the Smithsonian Museum, College of California, Davis, St. John’s School, Windfall Queen of the (Napa) Valley Medical Middle and lots of different establishments and non-profits.
Providers for Winiarski can be held privately, by invitation solely. The Winiarski household appears to be like ahead to a welcoming and joyous celebration of life for Warren and Barbara within the coming months.
About Warren Winiarski
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