THE AUSTRALIAN ARK – Federation to the Modern Era | 1900–1982
truck but carried the biggest load. In those days, it would take four and a half hours to drive from McLaren Vale to Nuriootpa. The work was relentless, but it enabled him to purchase land. Booth would also acquire the turn- of-the-century Honeypot Vineyard in the mid-1940s and develop a close relationship with Max Schubert after the war. Schubert would choose the Honeypot Vineyard as a source for his groundbreaking Penfolds Grange in 1951. Although history suggests that there was some greater thinking about fruit sourcing, this relationship would allow Max Schubert to harvest the fruit at the exact time he wanted. In 1938, Ron Haselgrove finished his association with Angove and joined Mildara Winery, but not without attempting to merge Angove, Stonyfell, and Mildara into one entity with the help of Ronald Martin, although this did not happen. Instead, Haselgrove began a long and distinguished career building the business into one of Australia’s dominant wine producers. One of his projects included altering his production to manufacture fuel out of molasses as an alternative to petrol. Haselgrove also played a vital role through his association (and a spell as chairman) with the Australian Wine Research Institute in tackling the major technical challenges of the times. Also in 1938, Colin Haselgrove, Ron’s brother, was appointed managing director of the Emu Wine Company but remained a technical director for Hardy’s for several years. He had been
The vintage season, however, never waits – that is, except on Sundays. It was typical for many workers to attend church rather than pick grapes. In the relatively peaceable days of 1938 and early 1939, Lyndsay Booth began trucking grapes for Penfolds. During the war, he gradually expanded his operations by carting wine between Clarendon, McLaren Vale, Magill, Marion, and Nuriootpa. Marion, at that time, before urban development, was considered a big grape-growing area. When petrol rationing became heavily controlled by the government, Lyndsay Booth got around the war regulations by painting the Penfolds- branded livery on his trucks. At first, wine was transported in 1,000-gallon wooden vats standing on the back of a truck and then, later, in steel-coated (emolite) 850-gallon tanks. Lyndsay Booth boasted that he had the smallest
A 1932 cartoon by Lionel Coventry depicting South Australian wine industry identities. [SLSA B 63094]
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