I've been asked to speak to a group in Newberg and it will be a challenge for me. It is a group that does not drink wine! I'll try to maintain, but they don't want to hear my usual spiel about wine and the Bible, and what a blessing wine is thought to be. They asked me to alter my talk instead talk about the wine pioneers of Oregon.
There is a phenomenon I think about just about every time I drive to Portland. As you leave Yamhill County there are vineyards on every side of the road. These vineyards are places of beauty (whether you like wine or not!) I'm always captivated by the rolling hills and the pattern of vines and trellises working their way up and down those hills. Then comes the terrible sign.
It's not that the sign is terrible, but what it foretells. Step into Washington County and the vineyards almost disappear. I was looking at the vineyard map put out by the Willamette Valley Wine Association in the Oregonian. I looked up the Yamhill County line, sketched it out on the map, and was amazed at how closely the wineries follow that line. Many on the Yamhill side, almost none on the Washington side. Why is that?
Why are the hillsides now filled with housing developments and, worst of all McMansions--huge 5000 + square foot monstrosities with at least three car garages. Why aren't there any vineyards? Perhaps the better question is to ask why are there so many on the Yahmhill County side.
The answer is the early wine pioneers. In 1973 David Adelsheim and David Lett (two of the original wine makers of the northern Willamette Valley) saw a great opportunity. The state had just instituted the Oregon Department of Land Conservation and Development. Lett and Adelsheim decided to map out the potential hillsides that might one day be developed as vineyards and had them designating as prime vineyard or agricultural zones. That meant that these lands could not be subdivided and developed, but were reserved for agricultural use.
Thanks to Dr. Jeff D. Peterson at Linfield College, I was blessed to hear David Adelsheim talk about that process a few years back. (That's him in the photo above.) He and Lett were not paid to do the work, they simply felt it was critical to the future of the industry to preserve these sights. What a blessing that has become for those of us who live in this area. Blessing those who live around us is one of the primary purposes of the church, I think. People may not even realize that we have done it. Many are not aware of the huge mark these early wine pioneers made, but I say a little blessing to them every time I drive up out of the hills of Newberg and head towards Portland.
