Synopsis "Passions: The Wines and Travels of Thomas Jefferson"
Through a combination of original research, imaginative writing, and beautiful illustrations, James Gabler has captured an intimate portrait of Thomas Jefferson at leisure, enjoying two of his passions--wine and travel. Jefferson was the most knowledgeable wine connoisseur of his age, and his favorite wines remain favorites of wine lovers today. He also loved to travel "to see what I have not yet seen." You will travel with Jefferson to the vineyards of Burgundy, Côte Rotie, Hermitage, Bordeaux, Provence, over the Alps into Italy, along the French and Italian Rivieras, through Lanquedoc on the Canal-du-Midi, down the Rhine with tastings at famous German vineyards. You will visit the great Roman antiquities of Gaul: Glanum, Pont du Gard, Masion Carrée, Théatre at Orange, Amphithéatres in Nîmes and Arles. You will eavesdrop on dinner conversations at his Paris residence on the Champs-Elysées, the White House and Monticello where the finest wines were served. You will be with him in Paris, London, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Heidelberg, Strasbourg, New York, Philadelphia and Washington. You will accompany John Adams and Jefferson into the English countryside to see the great landscape gardens. You will bear witness to the unfolding of the French Revolution through Jefferson's eyes. You will sail Lakes George and Champlain and visit the battlegrounds at Saratoga, Fort Ticonderoga and Bennington with Jefferson and James Madison. Wine was a lifelong passion; Jefferson called it "a necessary of life. His wine interests, however, went far beyond just drinking it. He was interested in its viticulture, making notes on German and Italian grape growing and examining "the details relative to the most celebrated wines of France." He planted vineyards at Monticello and experimented with grape growing in his Paris garden with vine cuttings from such famous vineyards as Montrachet, Chambertin, Clos de Vougeot, Hochheim and Rudesheim. He encouraged Philip Mazzei and John Adlum and others in their vineyard efforts and accurately predicted that America would, some day, make wines as good as those of France. He was a wine advisor to Presidents Washington, Madison, and Monroe. Throughout his life Jefferson was an advocate of the virtues of wine, arguing that "No nation is drunken where wine is cheap, and none sober where the dearness of wine substitutes ardent spirits as the common beverage." His wine advice to merchants and friends opened channels for the importation of wine into the United States from France, Italy, Germany, Spain, and Portugal. To encourage the importation of wine, he effectively lobbied Congress for a reduction in taxes while serving as Secretary of State, President and later in retirement. At a White House dinner in 1962, President Kennedy told a group of Nobel prize winners that "this is the most extraordinary collection of talent, of human knowledge that has ever gathered together in the White House with the possible exception of when Thomas Jefferson dined alone." But as you will learn, Jefferson, while President, rarely dined alone. Dinner conversations spanned the range of human knowledge with an emphasis on his passions-- architecture, music, wine, food, books, literature, gardening, and his years in France. James Gabler spent seven years researching and writing Jefferson's interests in wine and travel and has uncovered facts that have never before been revealed. He followed Jefferson's footsteps across Europe and the United States which has allowed him to update what Jefferson saw and drank. Here then is the definitive account of the wines and travels of one of the most extraordinary men in history.
