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97? damn, I gotta start drinking wine.
U.S. wine pioneer Ernest Gallo dies at 97
POSTED: 10:55 p.m. EST, March 6, 2007
Story Highlights• Gallo and late brother, Julio, founded E&J Gallo Winery in 1933
• They made wine for 50 cents a gallon -- half the going price
• Gallo is world's second-largest wine company by volume
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BERKELEY, California (AP) -- Ernest Gallo, who parlayed $5,900 and a wine recipe from a public library into the world's largest winemaking empire, died Tuesday at his home in Modesto. He was 97.
"He passed away peacefully this afternoon surrounded by his family," said Susan Hensley, vice president of public relations for E.&J. Gallo Winery.
Gallo, who would have been 98 on March 18, was born near Modesto, a then-sleepy San Joaquin Valley town about 80 miles east of San Francisco. He and his late brother and business partner, Julio, grew up working in the vineyard owned by their immigrant father who came to America from Italy's famed winemaking region of Piedmont.
They founded the E.&J. Gallo Winery in 1933, at the end of Prohibition, when they were still mourning the murder-suicide deaths of their parents.
Using $5,900 they borrowed and a recipe from the Modesto Public Library, Ernest and Julio rented a ramshackle building, and everybody in the family pitched in to make ordinary wine for 50 cents a gallon -- half the going price. The Gallos made $30,000 the first year.
"They started with virtually zero knowledge, they started with an idea and a drive that created the family empire that still exists and dominates today," said Peter Mondavi Jr., co-proprietor of Charles Krug Winery and a member of another influential winemaking family.
It grew to become the world's largest wine company by volume, a le since taken by Constellation Brands of New York. But Gallo remains second, selling an estimated 75 million cases under more than 40 labels.
"My brother Julio and I worked to improve the quality of wines from California and to put fine wine on American dinner tables at a price people could afford," Gallo told The Modesto Bee on his 90th birthday. "We also worked to improve the reputation of California wines here and overseas."
Ernest Gallo directed sales, devised marketing strategies and kept a short leash on distribution. Julio Gallo, who died in 1993, made the wine.
Gallo was no less tough on the people who worked for him as on those he battled for business. He also demanded total loyalty from his employees. In 1986, when he learned that two longtime Gallo executives were secretly planning to buy a winery of their own, he fired them on the spot.
Gallo was a courtly man with Old World manners. But in business he was tenacious, shrewd, aggressive, and secretive. He and others of the Gallo clan shunned publicity. The reason for the secretiveness, many of their former associates said, was the way his parents had died.
Fresno County records say their father, Joseph, shot their mother, Susie, to death in June 1933, then killed himself. That was two months before the founding of the Gallo winery.
Ernest Gallo was one of the country's wealthiest men, listed on the Forbes magazine list of the 400 richest Americans with a family worth of $1.3 billion.
His company employs more than 4,600 people and markets its wines in more than 90 countries.
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
97? damn, I gotta start drinking wine.
NOOOOOOOOO! he did so much for the community...
http://www.bumwine.com/nighttrain.html
http://www.bumwine.com/tbird.html
in awesome, I gots to get me some NightTrain
Jekka is in sackcloth.
the whole site is freakin' awesome. http://www.bumwine.com/
...we sampled almost all of them at a bachelor party in Louisiana last year.
Damn dude, seeing that MD 20 20 thakes me back to high schoolthe whole site is freakin' awesome. http://www.bumwine.com/
...we sampled almost all of them at a bachelor party in Louisiana last year.
our beverage of disaster was thunderbird...and that is nasty.
I will outlive you all!!
It's good to be a wino.
don't lie, it was strawberry hill.
OMG, that Thunderbird page is the funniest ing thing I've read in a long time.
My dad used to sing that song. "What's the word?"As pictured to the left, look for the pigeon feces and you'll find this old bird. As soon as you taste this swill, it will be obvious that its makers cut every corner possible in its production to make it cheap. Self-proclaimed as "The American Classic," Thuderbird is Vinted and bottled by E&J Gallo Winery, in in Modesto, CA. Disguised like Night Train, the label says that it is made by "Thunderbird, Ltd." If your taste buds are shot, and you need to get trashed with a quickness, then "T-bird" is the drink for you. Or, if you like to smell your hand after pumping gas, look no further than Thunderbird. As you drink on, the bird soars higher while you sink lower. The undisputed leader of the five in foulness of flavor, we highly discourage driking this ghastly mixture of unknown chemicals unless you really are a bum. A convenience store clerk in Show Low, AZ once told me that only the oldest of stumbling indian drunks from the reservation buy Thunderbird. Avaliable in 750 mL and a devastating 50 oz jug.
The history of Thunderbird is as interesting as the drunken effects the one experiences from the wine. When Prohibition ended, Ernest Gallo and his brothers Julio and Joe wanted to corner the young wine market. Earnest wanted the company to become "the Campbell Soup company of the wine industry" so he started selling Thunderbird in the ghettos around the country. Their radio adds featured a song that sang, "What's the word? / Thunderbird / How's it sold? / Good and cold / What's the jive? / Bird's alive / What's the price? / Thirty twice." It is said that Ernest once drove through a tough, inner city neighborhood and pulled over when he saw a bum. When Gallo rolled down his window and called out, "What's the word?" the immediate answer from the bum was, "Thunderbird."
WARNING: This light yellow liquid turns your lips and mouth black! A mysterious chemical reaction similar to disappearing-reappearing ink makes you look like you've been chewing on hearty clumps of charcoal.
All hail w_ _ e in a box!
One of my all time favorite Johnny Carson skits was a take off on the old Gallo "We will sell no wine before its' time" ads with Orson Welles.
Welles was the guest on the show and they had him do one of the spots live. Then at the end of the skit, when he delivers the "We will sell no wine before its' time..." line, they cut to Johnny dressed as a wino in an alley with a bottle in a paper sack and he belches and says "It'shh time!" followed by a long pull on the bottle in the sack.
I read that whole Bumwine website, thats some funny .
Has Jekka started her pilgrimage to California?
I heard she was supposed to be a ceremonial pallbearer at the funeral.
...now you need to taste them all.
The "Where to Buy" page was classic.
Holy ! They saw us?You'll find this beverage as often in a bum's nest as in the rock quarry where the high school kids sneak off to drink.
And who could forget this classic?
"I mix Champale and ripple and I call it 'Champipple' ". --Fred G. Sanford
I love the blatant exploitation of minorities in the advertisements from back in the day.
We whine and dine every night.
http://www.myspace.com/bumwine
The Myspace page is hilarious!
Cisco
18% alc. by vol.
Cisco is bottled by the nation's second largest wine company, Canandaigua Wine Co., in Canandaigua, NY and Naples, NY - the same company as Wild Irish Rose.
Known as "liquid crack," for its reputation for wreaking more mental havoc than the cheapest tequila. Something in this syrupy hooch seems to have a synapse-blasting effect not unlike low-grade cocaine. The label insists that the ingredients are merely "citrus wine & grape wine with artificial flavor & artificial color," but anyone who has tried it knows better. Tales of Cisco-induced semi-psychotic fits are common. Often, people on a Cisco binge end up curled into a fetal ball, shuddering and muttering paranoid rants. Nudity and violence may well be involved too. Everyone who drinks this feels great at first, and claims, "It's not bad at all, I like it." But, you really do not want to mess around with this one, because they all sing a different tune a few minutes later. And by tune, I mean the psychotic ramblings of a raging naked bum.
In 1991, Cisco's tendency to cause a temporary form of inebriated insanity led the Federal Trade Commission to require its bottlers to print a warning on the label (above right). The FTC also forced them to drop their marketing slogan, "Takes You by Surprise," even though it was entirely accurate. Read the FTC's full investigation on their own web page at this link. Since those days, Cisco is harder to find outside the slums, although the FTC's demonizing of the drink only bolstered its reputation for getting people trashed. Anyone who overlooks the warning and confuses this with a casual wine cooler is going to get more than they bargained for. Cisco will make a new man out of you. And he wants some too.
Our research shows that Cisco is actually the second best tasting of the five great bum wines, especially if you're having one of those hankerings for cheap Vodka, Jello and Robitussin. We must also note that Cisco is the best of all 5 bum wines at putting the darkest and puffiest bags under your eyes. The nuclear-tinted color of "Cisco RED" is reminiscent of diesel fuel. Most Cisco flavors are named by the fruit flavor that they are trying to emulate, but the one picture is simply called "RED." This chemical disaster will get your head spinning in no time. A test subject reports, "Strawberry Cisco has a bouquet similar to that of Frankenberry cereal fermented in wine cooler with added sprinkle of brandy for presentation." The sticky, sickingly sweet taste with a hint of antifreeze really comes through in the repellant taste of Cisco. Avaliable in various flavors, 375 mL and 750mL sizes. Down a whole 750 mL and you had better be ready to clear your calendar as you suffer through Cisco's legendary 2 day hangover.
So funny
Buckfast Tonic Wine
17% alc. by vol.
Huge demand from our friends in Scotland made it impossible to ignore this drink. However, the difference in the American English dialect has caused a misunderstanding about the purpose of this web site. The word "bum" in the US more commonly means a homeless person, also known as a "tramp," a "hobo," or a "wino." The purpose of this web site is to review wines that are popular with homeless people.
Buckfast is made in Devon, England at Buckfast Abbey by Benedictine monks. True to its name, Buckfast will get you "bucked up" real fast. Buckfast was thick, with a strong taste of molasses. There was also a hint of some type of herb reminiscent of oregano, and a soapy aftertaste. It makes you feel tired and dopey, rather than pumping you full of energy like some of its high-sugar American counterparts. However, with its hefty price of about $8 US per bottle, we were skeptical that homeless winos would spend their hard earned coins when there are cheaper alternatives. Our contacts in Scotland tell us that only the most hardened alcoholics drink this beverages, but the homeless winos reach for cheaper alternatives.
Like the great Sherlock Holmes, our UK investigator hit the alleys of London to see if there was any bumvidence to back up Buckfast's reputation as a bum wine. The discarded bumvidence littered in bums' nests pointed to the much more economically viable hard cider in 3 liter plastic jugs as the drink of choice rather than any of the wines. Our reporter brought a 3 liter jug of "White Ace" cider back to the states, which is 7% alcohol per volume and only about $3.50 US for the whole 3 liter jug. When the test subject drank the whole bottle of "White Ace," in Las Vegas, the effects were severe. He got kicked out of 4 Queens casino for washing his hands in a urinal, then fell asleep for 3 hours and woke up soaked in his own urine (see picture to the right). He woke up and got into a 6 year old's pirate costume, ran around slapping gamblers in the gut, got kicked out of The Imperial Palace, and became so obnoxious that his friends put him on a plane and sent him home early.
In summary, there are readily avaliable cheaper alternatives to Buckfast that have similar alcohol content. As far as we can determine, Buckfast is a wine for alcoholics, but out of the price range of the des ute homeless. Nevertheless, we salute it!
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