San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Mary Ann Graf, pioneer of women winemakers
Mary Ann Graf, widely considered the first woman winemaker in California after Prohibition, died Jan. 30 after a nearly three-year battle with pancreatic cancer. A representative of Graf ’s friends and family confirmed the news.
Graf is best known as the winemaker for Simi Winery in Healdsburg, where she preceded a string of other notable women winemakers. But the majority of her career was spent running Vinquiry, a laboratory that provided testing services to wineries. She was also the first woman board member of the American Society for Enology and Viticulture.
“She was a pioneer (and) helped many make wine better,” said James Laube, Wine Spectator senior editor. “She chose a career in the science side of wine before it was understood and appreciated.”
Born Oct. 23, 1942, in Turlock (Stanislaus County), Mary Ann Graf was the daughter of a vocational agriculture teacher and a registered nurse. She attended UC Davis, which counts her as the first woman to graduate with a degree in fermentation sciences.
“I wanted what I thought would be a hands-on kind of job when I graduated, and introduction to winemaking seemed like a way to get started in that direction,” Graf said during an interview with Martin Meeker for UC Berkeley’s Oral History Center in 2017. “I saw myself at the time not necessarily being a winemaker, but the laboratory aspect interested me.”
After graduating in 1965, Graf interviewed at Charles Krug and Beringer wineries in Napa Valley but ultimately went to work for Gibson Wine Co. in Elk Grove (Sacramento County), which made fruit wines and inexpensive table wines. She then moved to Sonoma County, where she worked for United Vintners and Sonoma Vineyards.
Her big break came in 1973 when Simi, a historic Healdsburg winery founded in 1876, hired Graf as its head winemaker. Her interview consisted of a five-hour tasting session with Andre Tchelistcheff, a legendary figure in 20th century California wine and Simi’s consulting winemaker at the time.
At one point while at Simi, Graf recalled in the Berkeley interview, she appeared on the game show “To Tell the Truth.” Contestants were presented with Graf and three men, and had to guess who was the true winemaker. The show’s producers figured that viewers would never expect the winemaker to be the woman.
Schieffelin, a New York company that imported Blue Nun and Moet & Chandon, purchased Simi in 1976, and three years later terminated Graf. Simi was going to expand production enormously, and “they needed an administrative winemaker,” she said in the Berkeley interview. “I didn’t want that sort of management.”
Zelma Long, another pioneering woman winemaker, succeeded Graf at Simi. “I met Mary Ann in 1976, traveling with her to France in a group of winemakers led by Andre Tchelistcheff,” Long said through a representative. “I knew of Mary Ann by her reputation as a woman winemaker leader; we traveled together, and she has been my closest friend since ... and very beloved by her wine and home community.”
In 1979, Graf departed Simi and started a business with her friend Marty Bannister. Initially housed in a Healdsburg podiatrist’s office, Vinquiry was an independent wine analysis lab, where a winery could bring samples to be tested for everything from acidity levels to alcohol percentages. The business grew enormously, in tandem with the booming Sonoma County wine industry, eventually adding three satellite laboratories. Graf worked with Vinquiry until her retirement in 2003.
Graf is survived by her brothers, Don and James Graf of Sacramento, and their families.
Esther Mobley is The Chronicle’s wine critic. Email: emobley@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @Esther_mobley Instagram: @esthermob