THE AUSTRALIAN ARK – Federation to the Modern Era | 1900–1982
Continuing technical problems, too, hampered wine production. The causes of sweet wine disease, as it was called, were still completely unknown. Some wineries, as mentioned earlier, were throwing out 25% or more of their affected stocks, which compromised profitability and greatly worried winery owners. This was also a time of generational change, with many employees at Penfolds, who had worked with Mary Penfold or Joseph Gillard, nearing retirement. In Western Australia, Jack Mann took over from his father, George, as winemaker at Houghton’s, leading to a golden period as the Great Depression came to a close. As many grapegrowers during the early 1930s faced bankruptcy with the decline in grape prices, this became the era of the cooperative winery, the beginning of new wine brands, and imaginative ideas. Roly Birks, unable to sell his fruit to the Stanley Wine Company, started selling his wines from the back of his truck out of casks, beginning the reputation of Wendouree as one of the legendary wineries of South Australia. According to a June 1935 article in the Adelaide Advertiser , it was already famous for its ‘high-class standard production of Wendouree Port and burgundy’. Maurice O’Shea, purportedly not a good manager and in deep financial trouble, was saved by McWilliam’s, which purchased his Mount Pleasant Estate and invested in new vineyards and equipment. But many producers continued to supply sweet, fortified wines to export businesses. At Kay Brother’s in McLaren Vale, over 70% of production in 1930 was sweet, fortified red. Yet, just 10 years earlier, most of its wines were made for the bulk dry red market and destined for ‘Burgoyne’s Dry Red or Emu Dry Red’ in the UK market. Such was the effect of the Wine Export Bounty Act of 1924, which encouraged and subsidised fortified wine production. Still, there was a market for table wine, both in Australia and in the British Isles. Penfolds Extra Special Royal Reserve Claret, Smith’s Yalumba Burgundy, Reynella Special Burgundy, Lindeman’s Cawarra Chablis, and Great Western Special Reserve Champagne and Minchinbury Sparkling Hock were among the best-known brands. . . . The transmission of vinestock material between wineries and vineyards was relatively commonplace during this time. In 1930, Arthur Colin ‘Col’ Laraghy of Kaluna Vineyard at Smithfield, on the outskirts of Sydney, had travelled to Mudgee to encourage growers and vignerons to plant more vines for his expanding winery intake. Among the cuttings were bundles of white pineau, which had been taken from the Kaluna Vineyard. This property was previously a part of the Orphan School (which had been established in 1803 by New South Wales Governor Philip Gidley King). This surviving vineyard, however, was founded in 1887 by JAM McLean and had been managed by Col Laraghy’s father, Ambrose James Laraghy, who had helped to establish the Daruka Vineyard near Tamworth and
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