December 26, 2001

Women of Wine

Women Behind Some Of Area’s Best Wineries

Sandy Obester, Obester Winery
When Sandy Obester’s grandfather, John Gemello, arrived in California from Italy in 1912, he had little money and spoke no English. So he found work in he only thing he knew: the vineyards.

In 1934 after Prohibition, John founded Gemello Winery in Mountain View. He and his son Mario ran the winery until John retired from at the age of 80.

But his interest in winemaking didn’t end with retirement. At 93 John went to live with granddaughter Sandy Obester and her husband Paul, who embraced John’s love for wine and winemaking.

Following John’s instructions, they began making small batches of wine in their Palo Alto garage. They enrolled in extension classes at UC Davis and after two years of home winemaking, decided to start a small commercial winery.

In Half Moon Bay they converted an old barn into a winery facility and a small carport into a tasting room. Obester Winery was born.

John went along to supervise. Sandy’s early training was spent mostly in the vineyards. When she took her grandfather to visit a grower about some dry farmed Zinfandel, he checked for ripeness by putting the whole bunch of grapes in his mouth. In this way, he would be able to sample the overall readiness of the vineyard for picking.

When Sandy visited vineyards on her own, she was usually met with surprise — it was not common for a woman to deal with the growers.

After Sandy’s uncle Mario Gemello retired, Sandy and Paul acquired the original Gemello winery and Sandy became the winemaker there, while Paul made the Obester wines.

Obester still produces big, hearty red wines under the Gemello label.

Following in the Italian tradition of customers going to their local winery to fill their own bottles, the couple started a BYOB program. On specified dates, Chardonnay or a red wine blend of Zinfandel and Sangiovese can be bottled into your clean bottles or bottles purchased at the winery.

Since Sandy is also a painter, she painted the watercolor for the label of their 1977 Petite Sirah, showing her grandfather leaning over a barrel at age 98.

The winery business remains full of surprises. Sandy recalled a wine tasting event at the Lupin Naturist Lodge in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

She tried to give her presentation on local Chardonnay and Pinot Noir vineyards, but had to turn her talk over to Paul. She couldn’t stay focused on her talk because of the presence of a large man sitting au natural in the front row.

Jane Prough, Epic Wines
On her first day of work at Central Coast Wine Company, young Jane Burr entered an empty warehouse: no office, no desk, no wine and no customers.

Jane had heard that Robert Prough was starting a wine distribution company and needed office help. Rob, Jane and a delivery person made up the initial staff.

Over the next 10 years, they found customers and Jane worked as receptionist, secretary and sales rep, in accounting and human resources. She eventually became the company’s operations manager.

In 1986 Jane left the company to marry Rob and stay home with their combined family of four children. She served the business by opening their home to visiting winemakers from all over the world, and the family shared many meals with guests who did not speak their language.

"What a gift for our children to witness the camaraderie that occurs over a good meal with good wine," Jane recalled.

Jane and Rob traveled through the many grape-growing areas of the world, observing the practices of other cultures in the most basic of rural settings.

In Spain their group of nine Americans was sitting outside a cantina with several members of a local wine co-op who spoke little English.

At one point they suddenly began singing a beautiful ballad that was representative of their village.

When it was the visitors’ turn to sing, the Americans could think of only one song on such short notice, and soon were singing, "Dinah won’t you blow your horn?" The Spanish wine growers loved it.

Rob and Jane sold their Central Coast Wine Company in 1989 and signed agreements that they would not conduct any wine business in California for five years.

In 1993 Epic Wines began importing wines for out-of-state sales only. The office was in their home.

During a typical day, Jane would conduct some wine business, throw laundry in the washer, conduct some more business, then go cheer at a high school baseball game.

Epic Wines is now eight years old and distributes wine in California, including imports from around the world. Jane ensures that their 50 employees do not sacrifice their personal lives for work.

She encourages them to bring their children to visit the workplace, and most days her office looks like a daycare center.

June Smith is herself a woman of wine, as co-owner of Roudon-Smith Winery in Scotts Valley.

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