CALIFORNIA WINERIES AND VINEYARDS: Amador, Delano and Santa Rosa

Adam S. Eterovich

The Santa Clara Valley was the first and largest agricultural area in California. Wine production reached its 61,000,000 gallon peak in 1880’s when the County produced a third of California's vintage. Croatians came to the Santa Clara Valley in the 1850’s from the goldmines and from San Francisco. They planted orchards, organized wineries and vineyards and opened many restaurants and other businesses in San Jose. They supplied their Croatian brothers in the gold mines with food and alcohol for their saloons and restaurants. They had a network from the goldfields of California to the silver mines of Nevada.

The Croatian vineyard pioneers in the Santa Clara up to the 1880’s were: Stephano Splivalo, Mateo Arnerich, Andrea Malovos, Mark Gazivoda, Nikola Anticevich, John Dragicevich, Antonio Zicovich, Peter Ljubetich, Luke Ivankovich, Peter Dragicevich and John Ivankovich.

The Great San Joaquin Valley of California also produced wines and vineyards. Croatian pioneers in this area up to 1920 included: Peter Miloglav, Martin Metcovich, Stephen Milosovich, John Matulich, Antone, Francis, George and Visko Zaninovich and John Kovacevich in 1919.

Amador, Delano and Santa Rosa Wineries

Sunce Winery (pronounced "sun-say', meaning "sun' in Croatian) originally One World Winery, was founded by Dr. Frane Franicevic. A native of the island of Hvar, Dalmatia, Croatia Frane was born into a family with a centuries-old winemaking tradition.

Frane, Janae, and their two daughters, Zora and Sunce, invite you to a down-to-earth, unpressured, and serene experience at their winery. Don't be afraid to bring the kids! Frane Franicevic has spent over eleven years in the wine industry and currently is owner and winemaker of Sunce Winery in Santa Rosa, California. After earning, a Ph.D in psychology, Frane turned to his love and passion which was winemaking. He developed this passion while growing up in Croatia because his parents and grandparents made wine and still do. Frane's wife, Janae, is in charge of marketing their wines.

Sunce is located in Santa Rosa at 1839 Olivet Road. Their tasting room is open 10:30 to 5 every day. Sunce is the perfect small winery as you can meet the winemaker.)

It might seem strange that the first thing Frane Franicevic wants to show a visitor to Sunce winery is an empty plot of land dotted with a scattering of little yellow stakes marking out a new addition to their existing 40'x6O' space. What he sees when he looks at the stakes is his brand new winery, where all operations will be under one roof: crushing, fermentation, barrel storage, bottling and case storage. Although the heavy rains have delayed groundbreaking, Frane says, with confidence, "the building will be completed by May."

Next he shares his excitement about the tidy four-acre home vineyard, planted with Pinot Noir in June 2001. Because the vines have been planted with tight spacing, Frane feels that the vineyard will furnish enough top-quality grapes for him to make about 1,000 cases of wine, which will be about half the total production of this tiny family winery.

For ten years the winery has remained at about the 2,000 case level - making 14 different wines, each, obviously very limited - about 150 cases of each. Three white wines - a Russian River Sauvignon. Blanc, a Chardonnay and a blend of Lake County grapes called Mistral are made each year, and they usually sell out by the first weekend of March, at the Russian River Wine Road barrel tasting event.

Sunce offers a diverse menu of unusual varietals and unique blends, such as Chardonnay, Symphony, Valdiquie, Mistral (a blend of 50% Chardonnay 40% Chenin Blanc, and 10% Sauvignon Blanc) and Mariage (a red Vintner's Blend). Frane produced two Pinot Noirs from the 2000 vintage. One, under the Nobility Franicevic label with the coat of arms of his family, granted in 800 A.D, was made from grapes drawn from a neighboring Piner Road vineyard. "It's a big, ruby red Pinot with a lot of character," Frane says. "We left a third of the berries whole, and fermented the wine for 26 days with extended maturation. There is a lot of spice in the nose and in the flavor.

"It's a lot of work for Frane," comments Janae, Frane's wife and partner, "but this wine started winning medals almost immediately." Awards are common for the Sunce wines which win gold medals and best of class rankings in almost every competition into which they are entered. Frane, who tends to be very philosophical credits the soil, climate, clones and Mother Nature with producing the wines which are constantly evolving into something more exciting. "You can't eliminate the intervention of the winemaker," he admits, “and it is my place to look at the barrel of wine, taste and recognize what it needs to bring it to its ultimate excellence."

The bungalow neatness of the tasting room provides an instant feeling of being welcomed as part of the family, and when Janae is behind the tasting bar, her sparkling enthusiasm for the wines, the winery and her visitors is contagious. Early in the winery's life the Franicevics followed the route of most new wineries, trying to attract distributors to handle their wines, but they soon took a step back ward and now all marketing is through direct sales. "By meeting the customers in person, or having contact with them through our club," says Janae, "we learn what it is they are looking for in the wines they select.

Dobra Zemlja Winery: In 1985 Milan and Victoria Matulich moved from the Bunker Hill region near Amador City, California to their property on 12505 Steiner Rd. in the Shenandoah Valley of Amador County. The property was known as the Stewart ranch, and the 50 acres on which they settled was the old homestead dating back to the 1870s. They planted grapes and numerous trees and ten years later established a winery they called Dobra Zemlja which means good earth in Croatian. The small winery currently produces 2000 cases of Viognier, Syrah, Sangiovese and Zinfandel. The Zinfandel, incidentaly, is the grape thought to have originated on the Dalmatian coast of Croatia. The winery is carved out of the sloping hillside under a restored 100 year old structure. Milan is the winemaker and Victoria, who is an artist, has her studio and a small gallery located above the winery. In mid-February the Amador wineries conduct the annual barrel tasting. Victoria, who hails from Idaho, prepares Croatian dishes for this event such a chevapchichi, sarma and preznac. These Dalmatian dishes combined with the big, robust wines have created a following and a reputation for earthy friendliness and warm hospitality that is associated with European wineries and specifically the Dalmatian konoba.

The family came to Sacramento December 19, 1946 from Egypt where they spent three years in a refugee camp at El-Shatt during World War Two. Sponsored by uncle Tom Matulich. Their father bought a parcel of land and started a chicken business. Father, Danilo Matulich, born in Postira Island of Brac in 1899 and mother Josephine, was born Josipa Schuster in 1907 at Nova Gradiska, Croatia. Children are: Irene, Serge, Milan, Daniel.

Pavich Vineyards-King of Organic Grapes: Steven Pavich: path to organic farming unfolds like a chapter in a late nineteenth-century dime novel. The son of a Croatian coal miner, Pavich traveled alone to California as a teenager, arriving in 1932 with $5 in his pocket.

He got his first taste of farming in the late 1930s, when he managed a 40-acre apricot orchard while attending Modesto Junior College. It was about this time he became friends with Steve Pandol, a prominent Delano grape grower, who often traveled to the coast to purchase fresh fish.

In 1953, when Pavich literally could no longer look at the ocean without becoming seasick, he gave up fishing, intending to take a job in a tuna processing plant in Long Beach. On his way there he stopped in Delano, where Steve Pandol’s son Matt took him out to see the old, 130-acre “rock-pile vineyard” near Richgrove. On the spot, Pavich decided to purchase it, investing his entire life’s savings in the down payment.

A latecomer to the table grape business, Pavich lost half his crop in a 1954 heat wave. With help from Matt Pandol he rapidly learned the fundamentals of growing table grapes, expanded his acreage, paid off his debts, added cold storage consisting of three boxcars hooked together, and conducted his own marketing.

In the early 1970s, when soil and production problems struck his vineyards, Pavich brought his eldest son, Steve jr., into the business. Over the next 20 years they developed a program of gradually eliminating commercial fertilizers and pesticides and substituting organic farming techniques in their places. The senior Pavich said his pioneering work was as difficult as putting together a 10,000-piece jigsaw puzzle whose top half is nothing but clear blue sky.

At the time of his death in December 1988, Pavich’s organic farming operation encompassed over 1,200 acres of vineyards in Arizona and California. With Steve Jr. handling the farming operations and the youngest son, Tom, and his wife, Tanya, managing the marketing and finances, Pavich Farms (which also includes organically grown produce, fruit, and even cotton) has become a truly family-run business.

The revolutionary impact of Pavich’s daring experiment is now being felt. Having seen that it is possible to farm commercially on a large scale using organic methods, dozens of big-name growers have developed experimental blocks of organically grown grapes.  Today in San Joaquin Valley’s table grape growing districts, there are more tons of compost being produced, and more acres of organic grapes being grown, than anywhere else in the world. California table grape growers are in the vanguard of organic techniques, thanks largely to the pioneering work of a Croatian immigrant grape grower named Steve Pavich. California Farmer May 6, 1989.