Robert Mondavi

Robert Mondavi (born June 18, 1913, Virginia, Minnesota, U.S.—died May 16, 2008, Yountville, California, U.S.) was an American winemaker who created American wines that rivaled European labels and helped generate the rebirth of California’s wine industry. He introduced the use of stainless steel tanks for cold fermentation, reinstated French oak barrels into the winemaking process, and inaugurated tastings and public tours of his winery.

Mondavi earned an undergraduate degree from Stanford University in economics and business administration and studied oenology at the University of California, Berkeley. He urged his father (then co-owner of a small California winery) to buy the historic Charles Krug Winery in 1943 and helped run the business with his father and brother for more than 20 years. After a falling out with his brother, however, Mondavi left the Krug Winery in 1965. The next year he established the Robert Mondavi Winery with the goal of producing world-class wines in California; it was the first major winery to be built in the Napa Valley since the 1930s.

Throughout his career, Mondavi partnered with vintners of international fame, most notably with Baron Philippe de Rothschild of France to create (1979) Opus One, a California cabernet sauvignon (Opus One later became a winery). Mondavi also collaborated with winemakers in Chile, Australia, and Italy. After additional family squabbles and several years of fluctuating wine sales, Mondavi sold his company in 2004 to Constellation Brands for $1.3 billion. He was coauthor of the memoir Harvest of Joy: My Passion for Excellence (1998) and was the subject of The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty (2007). Mondavi was honoured (2005) with the French Legion of Honour, and in 2007 he was inducted into the California Hall of Fame.