The northern Chihuahuan Desert has a long history of wine production. In the earliest days of Spanish settlement in the El Paso area, sacramental wine was a priority. Father García de San Francisco y Zuniga and Father Juan de Salazar planted grapevine cuttings originating in Spain, though presumably via missions in Mexico. This was around 1662. Over the subsequent decades, the mild climate and availability of irrigation water proved an ideal combination. Indeed, Zebulon Pike (of Pike's Peak fame) himself attested to the quality. Arrested by the Spanish in 1807, and escorted through El Paso, he recorded in his diary "numerous vineyards from which were produced the finest wine ever drank."
However, in the mid-1800s, a different opinion was registered, with
wine making in El Paso described as primitive, with the wine possessing a flat, sourish
taste. Legal wine production ceased in 1919, when the state legislature voted Texas
dry. In New Mexico, wineries flourished until Prohibition. By 1880, some 900,000
barrels of wine were said to be produced each year. Today, over 5,000 acres are in
production.
Contributor: Arthur H. Harris, Laboratory for Environmental Biology, Centennial Museum, University of Texas at El Paso.
Desert Diary is a joint production of the Centennial Museum and KTEP National Public Radio at the University of Texas at El Paso.