Labor of Love

I very much enjoyed your story on alumni wineries (“All In The Family,” June issue). To your list of esteemed alumni vineyards/wineries, I’d like to make a modest addition — mine, Chateau Marcelle (my daughter is Marcelle). Although it doesn’t have extensive acreage in Napa or Chile (just a small plot in my Long Island backyard), it’s not a livelihood-dependent commercial winery (just a very time-consuming hobby), and it doesn’t produce thousands of cases (just about 50 bottles in a good year, made in my basement, most of which I give away to family and friends), it is a labor of love. I plant and prune each vine, crush each grape, ferment each batch, and bottle/cork/label each bottle. And, as a self-professed Bruce Springsteen fanatic, over the years I have produced over 30 different wines commemorating over 30 different Springsteen albums.

I’ve also made wines to commemorate such things as my children’s weddings and our 35th Princeton reunion (above).