Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/326040
100 / the tasting panel / june 2014 "Truth in Wine" F orty years ago today, just about the only thing most people outside of Washington knew about Walla Walla was that it has a state peni- tentiary, and that Bing Crosby sang out its name in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court to delay getting the axe. This past March 20, 2014, the wine community in Walla Walla Valley came together to commemorate 30 years since the establishment of the Walla Walla Valley American Viticultural Area (AVA). At the "Fathers of Walla Walla Wine" event held on the stage of Walla Walla's historic Power House Theater, Leonetti Cellar's Gary Figgins fondly recalled how it all started—with the fruit wines he used to make during the early 1970s. "You have to start somewhere," he chuckled to an audience of about 100 Walla Walla wine lovers and industry folks. Woodward Canyon's Rick Small, another one of Walla Walla's found- ing figures, chimed in, telling us, "Gary's strawberry wine really rocked my world, I kid you not . . . I really thought, if you can capture this kind of truth in wine—a pure, ringing taste of strawberry—you ought to be able to get this done with wines made from actual grapes." Susequently Figgins and Small began experimenting with winemak- ing—from Vitis vinifera rather than berries—in Small's garage. Results were promising enough for Figgins to begin clearing land on the family farm, where wheat was still the major crop, to plant a vineyard. Figgins confesses, "We didn't know what the hell we were doing." But Small adds, "Ignorance is not knowing what you don't know, but then again you don't care about failing: No business plan, no problem!" WALLA WALLA VALLEY CELEBRATES 30 YEARS— NOT BY RESTING ON ITS LAURELS by Randy Caparoso Washington State vintners at the "Fathers of Walla Walla Wine" event (left to right): Norm McKibben (Pepper Bridge Winery), John Freeman (Waterbrook), Gary Figgins (Leonetti Cellar), Rick Small (Woodward Canyon), Marty Clubb (L'Ecole No 41), Eric Rindal (Waterbrook) and Casey McClellan (Seven Hills Winery). PHOTO: RICHARD DUVAL IMAGES, COURTESY OF WALLA WALLA VALLEY WINE ALLIANCE Gary Figgins (center) at Leonetti's first vineyard planting, PHOTO: COURTESY OF LEONETTI CELLAR TP0614_072-101.indd 100 5/23/14 9:40 PM