William Bradford Alwood

At the Paris Exposition

At the 1900 International Viticultural Congress

"Something good at GebruderHoehl Co. $1 worth of wine, $3 dollars worth of bubbles"

Harvey Wiley

Department and Division Heads of the Federal Bureau of Chemistry, Washington, D.C.; Alwood at far right

“The Savior of the Virginia Fruit Industry"

William Bradford Alwood was working for the Entomology Department of the U.S. Department of Agriculture when he was selected to head the new experiment station at the Virginia Mechanical and Agricultural College (later Virginia Polytechnical Institute, or "Virginia Tech"), and he directed immediate attention to the grape-growers dilemma in Albemarle. Delivering lectures and demonstrations and writing articles, he helped local grape-growers who were receptive to his ideas. Alwood was hailed in the state as “the savior of the Virginia fruit industry.”

After devoting almost 15 years to teaching, research and writing for the horticulture, entomology and mycology departments at the Virginia Mechanical and Agricultural College, as well as working part-time for the U.S.D.A., Alwood took a leave of absence in 1900 to attend the Paris Exposition and to research cider-making in Europe under the auspices of Harvey Washington Wiley’s Bureau of Chemistry.

Both Wiley and Alwood attended the 1900 International Viticultural Congress in Paris and participated in judging the wine competition there.

Impressed with Alwood’s progress, Wiley offered him continuing financial assistance for his European education and investigations into fermentation processes, which, of course, applied equally to wine as to cider (in Germany called “apple wine.”) Alwood returned to America in 1901 with flasks of yeasts and musts from Europe’s wineries and cideries.

In 1907, with the passage of the Pure Food and Drug Act, Wiley appointed Alwood the director of the new U.S. Department of Enology which he established next to Alwood’s home, Stonehenge, on the Rio Road in Charlottesville. Here Alwood through his chemical analysis would establish winemaking standards to meet the requirements of the Pure Food and Drug Act.

According to Wiley, “These investigations of Alwood’s show that the makers of wine in New York and Ohio can no longer scientifically claim the privilege of stretching their wines with sugar. Sugared wines are essentially adulterated, even if labeled as such. The rigid investigations of Alwood have also shown that there is no basis for the belief that the acidity of properly made American wines is excessive. I have lately (1917) tested a bottle of pure Virginia red wine made by Alwood in 1904 and found it has kept perfectly and has qualities which entitle it to rank among the good red wines of the Medoc.”

Though the investigations of Alwood’s wine laboratory were transferred to the Internal Revenue Department in 1913, (as Prohibition forces increased), Alwood continued to receive honors for his distinction in wine research and other fruit processing investigations both nationally and internationally, culminating in his election as president of the International Congress on Viticulture in San Francisco in 1915.

Alwood's "Stonehenge" (house and lab on hill)

"Stonehenge" and lab in rear

Alwood inspects vineyard in Elciego, Spain

"Professor (Alwood) explaining about egg of Flea beetle to Mr. Buhan, Bordeaux"

Grapery at Dept. of Agriculture

Alwood in his laboratory at VMAC

Alwood's entymology lab, 1897