When the World Tips Over

Viticulture, or the cultivation of grapes, began in what is now California with the system of Spanish missions that evolved in the 18th century. On the heels of exploration, Spanish monks built institutions meant to educate the Indigenous peoples—often through compulsion—in Spanish culture, including Spanish farming practices and the Catholic religion. The native grapes were considered unpalatable, so grapevines were imported from the Mediterranean, and the Mission grape provided wine for the sacrament of communion. When the missions were secularized by the Mexican government (which ruled the territory of California at the time), military commander Mariano G. Vallejo bought thousands of acres once belonging to the northernmost Mission San Francisco Solano. He soon found that the combination of climate and soil surrounding his new town of Sonoma provided favorable growing conditions for viticulture.

The Gold Rush beginning in 1849 brought thousands of new people to San Francisco. This boom is romanticized in the novel as a heyday of freedom and lawlessness, including the cheerful subversion of gender and sexual norms. In the 1850s, Agoston Haraszthy emigrated from Hungary to Sonoma with tens of thousands of grapevine cuttings from his native Hungary as well as other European grapes. He established the first commercial vineyard in the state, Buena Vista Winery.