THE AUSTRALIAN ARK – Federation to the Modern Era | 1900–1982
Len P Evans with Australian prime minister and wine aficionado Malcolm Fraser, 1980s. [Sally Evans Collection]
Mr Malcolm Fraser was a regular customer at Prahran during the 1980s. He would come in with his wife, Tammy, and his mother-in-law, who was wheelchair bound. It was not a particularly disability-friendly store at the time. Mrs Tammy Fraser would push the elderly lady in the chair and Mr Fraser would ‘issue’ his orders for the wines he required. He would then instruct you to summon his driver when the goods were ready, to collect both him and his party and the goods. On one occasion he requested a bottle of Sassicaia, which we did not carry. He instructed me to go around the corner to a local Italian wine specialist and purchase a bottle there. So, armed with his credit card, that is exactly what I did. He certainly enjoyed a good drop, and was not at all concerned about pricing. – Garry Hindson, Dan Murphy’s wine merchant, on PM Malcolm Fraser
Viticulture and vineyard management became priorities in the early 1980s. As the wine market gathered steam, both in Australia and overseas, there was an increasing need for effective systems and intelligent practices for both large-scale and smaller-site vineyards. A brand-new era in trellising systems emerged to optimise yields and quality. The Scott Henry Trellis System was developed by the grower and producer Scott Henry in his vineyards in the Umpqua Valley, in Oregon, in the US. Four canes, versus the customary two, provided the fruit for each vine, and four replacement spurs were selected for renewal growth. A modified version, developed by Dr Richard Smart and John Dyson, called the Smart Dyson Trellis, was adopted by many producers in Australia because of its suitability for mechanical harvesting and machine pruning. According to Bryce Rankine, ‘The concept of vine canopy management was largely developed by Richard
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