Marvelously ingenious and perfect, from a mechanical
standpoint; worthless commercially, the costiliest machine ever built will
stand in a Cornell university laboratory as a monument to Mark Twain's vanished
fortune. – New York Evening Telegram October 9, 1898
Mark Twain went broke trying to financially back a new
typesetting machine. A former typesetter himself, Twain knew that it was hard
work, and that any improvements to its laborious machinations would be a huge
advance in the business. But the Paige Typesetter, while being an interesting
machine, had no commercial application. It was a good idea and an impractical
one all at the same time. But no one had more reverence for typesetters and
their work than Twain.
Strange thing about a press. It can be used to squeeze a
person’s thoughts out onto to a piece of paper, or turn a fruit into a glass of
wine. Each task takes something and makes it into another. One takes an idea
and gives it form, solidity, and shape. The other takes something solid and
turns it into an idea. No one knows that more than Ed Miller.
Ed Miller’s trip into the world of wine is one of the
longest winding roads I have ever encountered. Ed, throughout his lifetime, he
has worked with presses of varying types.
Ed was born in Dutchess County. His father loved the country
life, and his mother couldn’t abide it. They moved to the Bronx in 1960, and
Long Island two years later. But Ed loved the farming life. He was a country
boy at heart. He had an Aunt who had a farm in Dutchess county. He spent as
much time there as he possibly could. And as he grew older, he spent summers
when he could helping out on the farm.
But Ed also needed a job, so he went into the typesetting
business. Still living on Long Island, he started working for a print shop that
did typesetting for magazines and advertising. He also worked on typesetting
for products, the most difficult of which was having to squeezing mountains of
tiny type on bottles of Helena Rubenstein nail polish bottles. Ed was versed in
hot type and linotype. He’d worked in rooms where there were huge trays of
die-cast printers letters. He was a press man and eventually became the night
foreman of the print shop.
But Ed never tired of the agricultural life. He kept
spending time in the country. And through his cousin, he met a family – the
Goold family, who he’d helped out from time to time. There he met and fell in
love with the farmers daughter, Sue Goold.
The two married, and lived on the island for a little while
before it became clear they were headed back to the farm. Ed became a farmer in
the winter of 1977 at Goold Orchards.
The Goold family have been farming their land for more than
100 years. It is a Centennial Farm. Goold Orchards story begins in the early
spring of 1910. Newlyweds James and Bertha Goold arrived by rail at Castleton’s
town hub, a small whistle stop called the Brookview Station and walked to the
farm they had recently purchased. Bertha, schooled at Emma Willard in Troy and
husband James, a recent graduate from Cornell were eager to apply the latest in
agricultural technologies on their new fruit farm. In 1933 after James’ sudden
death, Bertha and her son teenage son Robert continued to operate and grow the
family farm. In 1941 Bob married Marcia Grainer and together settled into the
business of raising a family and running the apple farm. They continued to work
and grow the family fruit farm into what is now Goold Orchards. Bob and Marcia
eventually passed the day to day running of the farm onto their children.
Ed learned the difference between a MacIntosh and a
Delicious. He learned about pruning in cold weather. Spraying crops, and
picking apples, and about making cider. And that’s when iron entered into Ed
Miller’s life.
Goold Orchards is one of the largest producers of apple
cider in the region. They press thousands of gallons a week for local and
regional supermarkets as well as for their own farm store. And that’s when Ed
first started working with another kind of press. A cider press. Suddenly, he
realized, he’d traded in trays of letters in for bins of apples. From ink and
paper, he had now graduated to juice and plastic bottles.
In the meantime, Ed became involved with the Cornel
Cooperative Extension and the Hudson Valley Cornell Lab. He’s been involved
with the lab for more than 20 years. He is on their board of directors. It’s
his new raison d’etre. The HV Lab is
an important asset to the valley, and Miller will be happy to tell anyone who
listens why it is needed. It was founded basically by apple farmers, back when
the valley was dominated by them. But today it is used to gage many fruit
growing issues, from apples, to berries, to vegetables and even grapes.
Today, with cut, after cut, after cut, from the state, the
Hudson Valley Laboratory is in danger of having it’s Cornell staff withdrawn.
It’s an expensive proposition in a time of fiscal trimming. It is not the only
Cornell outpost in trouble within the state.
“It’s important to be involved in it. The Hudson Valley lab
is a great information source. We have a unique growing region. We don’t have
the Lake Affect they have in the Finger Lakes We don’t live near the ocean or
benefit from Long Island Sound. We live in the Hudson Valley. It is a unique
climate, That’s what makes the station so important. As a farmer, I need to
know what’s happening here, in the Valley. Not what’s happening elsewhere in
the state. What insects are coming u through the valley? What parasites or
disease pressure?”
The Lab has experimental orchards and vineyards. They can
ell you their historical data on what has had good impact on their crops, and
what has had deleterious effects Ed was lamenting that what killed the
raspberry harvest this season wasn’t a wet spring but an infestation of fruit
flies that destroyed the fruit. That’s why to him, the Lab is so important. He
urges all folks, grower and winemakers to help get involved in the station, to
make use of its resources and to make sure it survives and thrives over the
next 20 years. “We need that station to remain open.”
In 2007, 30 years after he began pressing apples for cider,
Goold introduced Brookview Station Winery, and farm winery based at Goold’s
Apple Orchards. They were the first
winemakers in Rensselaer County.
“The winery has taken the farm into a whole new
demographic,” Marketing Director Karen Gardy told Hudson Valley Wine magazine.
“When we started the winery, it made us a year round destination.”
Sue and Ed are also big proponents of Pride of New York. The
Pride of New York is the state’s branding program for the promotion of New York
State food and agricultural products. In addition to helping consumers find New
York food, the program also assists farmers and food processors in promoting
their products by using the Pride of New York emblem.
“The Pride of New York program helps so much, for not only
us, but businesses across the state,” Ed told the press. “They do such a good
job of promoting the quality products and produce which are produced in this
state.”
The biggest surprise came to the fledgling Brookview Station
Winery when it shocked the Hudson Valley wine community when it took the
prestigious Cornell Cup when Whistle Stop White won best wine in the Hudson
Valley in 2007, topping even Millbrook Vineyards! It was a semi-sweet, off-dry
apple wine!
The first wine was an easy decision. Goold Orchards grows 16
different varieties of apples on 17, 000 apple trees on more than 100 acres.
The semi-dry apple wine made its debut at the 2006 Goold Orchard Annual Apple
Festival, and before the 2-day event was over, the first bottling had sold out!
The wine drew great reviews and became an immediate hit.
Lenn Thompson, Editor-in-Chief of the New York Cork Report wrote, “I'm excited
to publish this review… because it represents a new category of adult beverages
being covered here on the NYCR -- fruit wines. Many people scoff at the
category without even exploring the wines within it, but I'm enthusiastic to
try and learn about anything, including fruit wines in the Hudson Valley -- and
there are a lot being made there. And you know what, I think this Brookview
Station Winery Whistle Stop White ($13) has its place….”
Thompson gave the wine its props, writing, “The nose is
simple, showing fresh-cut apple and something lightly floral. It brings more of
the same to a medium-bodied palate that shows a bit of sugary sweetness at
first, but finished almost dry, with a little rustic apple skin bitterness that
actually worked quite well…”
Whistle Stop won five Gold Medals over the next four years,
and garnered nine medals and awards over all! Ed presses thousands of gallons
of apple cider for grocery stores and shops throughout the region, but now he
also puts in hours standing over his wine press. As much as he is a farmer, he
is now a pressman all over. Whether the cider press or the wine press, Ed is
always squeezing something.
The next wine was Oh What a Pear! An off-dry pear wine,
which is sold in 750ml bottles, as well as splits. The fine pear fragrance is
accompanied by a kind of cobbler-esque bready smell, with some honey and
apricot thrown in. Lovely. Again, one of the better fruit wines in the valley. That was followed “Pomona” (“Goddess of the
Orchards”) an apple-pear fruit wine. Three dessert style table wines were added
in February 2008, “Lotta Bing” cherry wine, “Just Peachy” peach wine and
“Strawberry Sunrise” strawberry wine. All were very good wines, and sold
through immediately.
Then there was All Aboard Red and semi-sweet red table wine
which was also a very popular choice.
Then along came Sunset Charlie which is easily one of their
biggest successes. A semi-sweet blush wine, with a picture of their dog Charlie
on the label, this wine took off like a rocket! It is currently among the
staples of their wine list, and one of the backbones of their wine business.
Ed continued to make ground as a serious fruit winemaker. “The
Conductor’s Cassis” is a black currant cordial that winemaker Ed Miller says
“is handcrafted in the traditional style of French artisan winemakers.” It is
one of the best, fruit forward Cassis in the valley.
Staying with the train theme, Brookview also released
Porter’s Port, a port-like desert wine made from two different tyoes of
cherries. Cherry wines are dicey. Made badly, then often end up tasting like
Formula 44D. But this was no cough-syrup. This was a lovely dessert wine with
overtones of cherry, vanilla, mocha, and spice. An excellent dessert wine. Nice
acidity. Not too sweet.
Truly, Ed had now cemented a portfolio of excellent fruit
wines. But there was more. Brookview expanded their wine list by using outside
grapes to offer a Merlot and Baco Noir which both were very good. But it was
just a softening up of the beaches. Ed was now ready to storm the wine world.
After releasing what else, a cider named Jo-Daddy’s Hard Cider to chime in with the
immense popularity of hard cider these, Ed had something else up his sleeve.
Several years ago, Ed decided to plant grapes, choosing
French-American hybrids and Wisconsin varieties to plant vineyards throughout
the farm, tucked between orchards. Marachel Foch, Frontenac, and Marquette were
the grapes he chose. Being a farmer and a grower now by trade, his vineyards
flourished! Exploded in fact, and he had a full crop on the third year. And
what did he do with the first year? He released Brookview’s ultra-premium wine,
Estate Frontenac.
This was a bombshell of a big red wine. Big fruit, with
decent structure and solid backbone, this is as lovely a Frontenac as I have
had anywhere (see the separate review). It is a sign that Ed Miller has passed
yet another milestone in his career. From setting type like jewels, he now
setting fruits like jewels.
Ed Miller is a pressman through and through. He’s been
squeezing stuff through the press his whole life. Now he’s squeezing his whole
life in a press.