Bo Barrett: The man at Chateau Montelena

A seismic tasting 50 years ago

When a small group of California wines triumphed over France’s finest at the 1976 Judgement of Paris, few could have imagined the global shockwave it would set in motion.

Staged by the late Steven Spurrier (Decanter Consultant Editor for 25 years), the tasting event was meant to be a bicentennial celebration, pitting upstart American producers against benchmark French estates.

Instead, it redefined the hierarchy of fine wine and altered the course of California’s future.

The result – Burgundy’s most esteemed whites being bested by a Napa Valley Chardonnay from Chateau Montelena (a bottle of which now sits in an exhibit in the Smithsonian in Washington, DC) – cemented not only the estate’s reputation but also the credibility of an entire region.

Half a century later, the story still reverberates.

The event remains a symbol of innovation, resilience and the restless spirit that continues to drive Napa Valley.

For Bo Barrett (current CEO and son of Jim Barrett, the late winery founder), who was just 18 when the winning 1973 Chardonnay was bottled, the tasting was a catalytic moment – one that transformed his family’s modest dream into a global legacy.

In this conversation, exclusive to Decanter, Barrett looks back on the early days of Montelena, his father Jim’s improbable leap from law to wine, and the unvarnished realities behind a victory that helped reshape the American viticultural dream.

Decanter, in conversation with Bo Barrett

You were only a teenager when your father bought Chateau Montelena in 1972. What do you remember about those early days?

I remember that it was all quite remarkable.

Two factors stand out in my mind that led my dad to Montelena. The Vietnam War was going really badly at the time, and top income tax rates in the US were extraordinarily high.

My dad was a real estate and tax attorney for a company that built malls around the world, and when he saw that President Nixon had introduced new incentives to revive American agriculture – which was struggling – he spotted an opportunity.

The administration had just expanded major investment tax credits and accelerated-depreciation rules for agricultural projects.

In effect, if you were a high earner, you could either hand a huge portion of your income over in taxes, or you could invest that same money into American agriculture instead.

My dad’s business partner always called Montelena ‘the tax dodge that got out of hand’.

Were you with him when he first set eyes on Montelena?

I was with him on the second trip.

My dad was a pilot, and we’d fly around together looking at pomegranate and citrus groves, cattle ranches, all these different things.

I was probably 17 when I came with him on his second trip to check out Chateau Montelena.

This lake was totally overgrown. It was a total jungle. The vineyards were completely run down.

When did you realise this wasn’t just a family project but might be your life’s work?

I didn’t know I was going to be a farmer until that first summer. I came up and started working in the vineyard and kind of just took to it.

The vineyard manager was an Italian-American named John Roll. He’d ploughed with a mule for Madame [Hélène] de Pins at Beaulieu vineyard.

He taught me how to hunt deer, collect abalone and forage for mushrooms – all this good stuff. He taught me the joy of the mason, which is the pride you take in a hard day’s work.

What do you remember about that famous 1973 Chardonnay around bottling time?

From the summer of 1973 and all the way to ’76, my whole family was here. The bottle that’s in the Smithsonian – I know I filled that bottle.

My brother Mike put the nitrogen on the bottle, and my little brother Kev put the bottles in the case. My whole family’s fingerprints are on that bottle.

Tell us about the day that Steven Spurrier visited the winery.

I remember [the winemaker] Mike Grgich being very nervous and making us get the cellar pristine, super-spiffy clean. It was a VIP tour, same as when Robert Mondavi was coming – everything had to shine.

We had to pull the magic disappearing act: all the staff go away, no one’s around. I wasn’t there watching Steven taste.

Mike probably sent me to the vineyard. Honestly, we didn’t pay that much attention until later.

What about when the results of the Paris tasting came in?

When the telegram came in, we were in the cellar working, filling barrels, and the doors were wide open.

Grgich was out in the gravel parking lot, dancing and waving this piece of paper and yelling, ‘We won! We won!’ So we turned off our pumps and walked out. We were all joining him in this little Yugoslavian victory dance.

It was a hell of a surprise. George Taber [then a Time magazine reporter and the only journalist present at the event, and subsequently author of the 2006 book on the topic] called my dad, and my dad gave him a quote. He didn’t want to insult the French: ‘Not bad for kids from the sticks.’

In what ways and how quickly did things change for Montelena after the article in Time came out?

It was immediate. Suddenly, we had distributors calling from all over the country.

The people who had said, ‘No, we don’t carry California wines’ the week before called us up and said, ‘Hey, we’d like to sell your wine.’ The phone was lighting up.

We didn’t have a general manager, but the California ‘attention’ didn’t change that much.

The first immediate change was that the rest of the country recognised that California was making good wine.

You’ve said before that the Judgement of Paris was a catalyst rather than a miracle. What do you mean by that?

All the ingredients were there: the land, the light, the people, the willingness to do the work.

If there had never been Prohibition, California would’ve buried Europe a century ago.

The most important thing is, it made quality such a driving force for everybody’s goal and mission.

So it had that drive towards improved quality, which then drove consumers to seek out a superior product. And so it became a self-perpetuating thing.

How do you see the next 50 years for Napa Valley?

It’s going to be as tough as the last 50. Work harder than anybody, pick the steep hill and keep climbing.

When you think about legacy, about Chateau Montelena’s place in history, what comes to mind?

I do think about what we’ve accomplished with just trying to do the right thing – to make something special out of a special place. The drive to express American excellence is what we’re the proudest of.

And I just hope that the people who fall in behind us in this business understand that you have to do the hard work and keep your nose to the grindstone and have the right philosophy, which is always to reward people’s faith.

They’re taking a bet on buying your product and your job is to make that bet pay off.

Three of my four grandparents were immigrants. The other was born in a covered wagon. No wine experience at all. The opportunity that was presented to us by this great country – it’s been a good thing.

We’re just quiet about it. People ask, ‘Are you going to retire?’ I say, hell no. I love what I do.

I’ve got a beautiful place, friendly people to work with and a fantastic crew. It’s a nice little ship. I don’t want to give it up.

Benchmark Napa: A taste of modern-day Montelena

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