Come for the shaking, stay for the wine
It’s always a little surprising when Hollister or San Benito
County is mentioned in media other than the local newspapers.
”
What do they want with us?
”
we wonder, casting a skeptical eye at the news outlet.
Come for the shaking, stay for the wine
It’s always a little surprising when Hollister or San Benito County is mentioned in media other than the local newspapers.
“What do they want with us?” we wonder, casting a skeptical eye at the news outlet.
The insular nature of our community is what makes it attractive for many residents – we are far enough away from Hwy. 101 to be off the beaten path, but close enough to major roads to be a short drive from the coast or larger urban areas.
We can watch Salinas and Monterey television channels and find out the weather in Hollister, but they tend not to cover our community unless there is a major court case, tragic accident or biker rally going on.
The Salinas Californian mentions San Benito High School sports teams when Salinas-area teams are facing the Balers. The San Jose Mercury News gave up covering our county a few years ago, though the Baler football team still appears in the CCS rankings.
As noted here a few months back, the Los Angeles Times wrote a story about the Hollister-Abercrombie & Fitch “controversy” over who really owns the name (We do, by the way.) It offered a typical perspective on our community, mentioning how our sleepy town is bordered by fields of lettuce and rustled awake by the occasional earthquake.
Most of the coverage by these outside media sources becomes an outsider’s look at an area that is still quaint and agricultural – just like the old days – and sometimes it’s about how our rural area is battling outside influences that want us to change and grow.
Last Saturday, however, a piece of our quaint little agricultural county warranted a front-page story in no less than The Wall Street Journal.
Titled, “Shaken or Stirred, This Winery is a Big Hit with Seismologists,” the article talked about how DeRose Vineyards at 9970 Cienega Road has “achieved cult status” not so much for its wine as its drainage ditch, which straddles the San Andreas Fault.
Earthquakes and the fault and cracked buildings are part of our normal lives here. Readers of the Journal elsewhere in the country probably are more interested in the earth’s daily rumblings than we are. So the story makes sense.
Pat DeRose, who along with his son, Alfonse, have dry-farmed at the winery for the past 21 years, said the newspaper’s reporter and photographer came to San Benito County about a month ago to write about how the site “has become a must-see for geologists, seismologists and science buffs.”
“They come for the San Andreas Fault,” the Journal story said, “which cuts a clear path through the winery’s main building. One side of the structure sits on the Pacific plate, the other on the North American.”
It also quoted excited professors and geologists who study what is dubbed “a geologic marvel”: the creeping fault that is slowly tearing the building apart.
It’s an interesting story, to be sure, particularly for people on the east coast who probably can’t imagine how anyone would choose to live or work on top of an active earthquake fault.
The coverage in the Journal has had a wonderful side effect for the winery: its phone has been ringing off the hook.
A woman answering the phone this week said; “We’ve been very busy” since the article appeared.
“A lot of people are interested in seeing the crack and tasting the wine,” she said. “We’re also getting calls from people from other states who want the wine.”
Pat DeRose said the response has been “pretty good.”
“We’ve gotten a lot of people from out of town visiting; people who hadn’t been here before,” he said. “All in all it’s been a good deal for us.”
The Journal story quotes Alphonse DeRose as saying the geologists who visit the winery tend to stand out from the normal guests looking to sample a robust glass of Negrette.
“Their pants always have zippered pockets. The khaki pants and the funny hat, and you know it’s a geologist.”
The story was interesting and our typically skeptical eyes appreciated the coverage our county received in a well-respected national forum. Best of all, it has had aftershocks of the good kind – as in a monetary benefit.
Adam Breen writes a blog at http://thebreenblog.blogspot.com and teaches newspaper and yearbook classes at San Benito High School. He is former editor of The Free Lance.
