'LONDON— Robert M. Parker Jr. , widely regarded as the world’s most powerful wine critic, has announced he will no longer taste Bordeaux en primeur.
The Wine Advocate founder, credited as the creator of the 100-point wine rating scale, says the time is right for him to step back from the pressure of reviewing more than 600 wines from barrel.'
It is interesting how certain claims get repeated until they become 'held truths'. Take the nation that Robert Parker was the first to adapt the 100-point scale used in the USA to mark school essays to assess wine. Will Lyons, in yesterday's The Wall Street Journal is only the latest to repeat this 'fact' – 'credited as the creator of the 100-point wine rating scale'.
Instead detailed research from the excellent Aaron Nix-Gomez (https://hogsheadwine.wordpress.com/) indicates that the use of a 100-point scale may well predate Robert Parker by some 125 years. So we may well be able to credit Robert with the modern calibration of the 100-point scale but not its creation. There is no doubt that it was Parker who popularised the 100-point scale and made it known around the wine world as that it is now the most used scale..
Although it is hardly surprising that a scale used to assess American wines in the mid 19th century didn't immediately grab the wine world's attention, Parker's remarkable and so far unique success is probably due to a blend of right place, right time, his energy and focus plus people's liking for ratings.
Although it is hardly surprising that a scale used to assess American wines in the mid 19th century didn't immediately grab the wine world's attention, Parker's remarkable and so far unique success is probably due to a blend of right place, right time, his energy and focus plus people's liking for ratings.
“Assuming 100 to be the standard for best”: The 100-point wine scale predates Robert Parker’s by 125 years
During my recent visit to Albuquerque I came across numerous
references indicating that the wines of Bernalillo, located just north
of Albuquerque, were celebrated next to those of El Paso in what is now
Texas. One such example appears in Colonel James F. Meline’s account of
his summer tour Two Thousand Miles on Horseback (1866).[1]
Colonel Meline took time to stop and taste several of the wines in
Bernalillo. He found that the “wines are capable, with proper
treatment, of being made excellent” from the “superior” grapes.
Unfortunately, the wine was “inexpertly handled” and “used almost as
fast as made”. Thus old wines were “almost out of the question.” It
was later in Albuquerque that he was able to drink a Bernalillo wine
“that was quite as good as any made at El Paso.”
Colonel Meline must have been suitably impressed by the Bernalillo
wine he tasted in Albuquerque for he sent two bottles to the American
Wine Growers’ Association of Cincinnati, Ohio. The Association
published in its proceedings, which Colonel Meline reproduced in his
appendix, that the 1861 white wine received a “vote 90” and the red wine
“81.” According to George Graham, Esquire, President of the
Association, the white wine “was considered better than most wines of
the same age, either of Catawba or good Rhine wine.” The wines were
judged “by figures marked up to 100, which is the highest character of
wine of any kind…Most of our Ohio wine does not reach the excellence of
the wine presented to you.”
“That we may know the relative value of their own manufacture”: The
spread of the 100-point wine scale in late 19th century America
By the 1850s Ohio was the largest wine producing state in the country
with the Catawba vine the mostly widely planted. These vines soon
began to show disease. In response, the American Wine Growers’
Association of Cincinnati, Ohio set out to find hardier vines that would
produce wine just as good as their favorite Catawba. To evaluate
experimental lots of wine the Association developed a 100-point wine
scale which they first employed in 1853. This scale continued to be
used by the Association for the rating of all wines through at least
1870. Ohio was not the only state to employ the 100-point scale.
The spread of the 100-point scale follows the rise of state
horticultural societies interested in the cultivation of vineyards and
production of wine. The spread appears particularly active in the
1860s. There was an interest in improving the quality of wine to gain
access to the sales market of domestic and foreign wine. The scale
facilitated judging committees in picking the top wines from several
dozen samples as well as to compare both within and across tastings.
Judging committees were typically made up of three to five members.
The final score for a wine was simply the average of each judge’s
score. The top wines were then those with the highest final score.'
https://hogsheadwine.wordpress.com/2015/01/06/that-we-may-know-the-relative-value-of-their-own-manufacture-the-spread-of-the-100-point-wine-scale-in-late-19th-century-america/
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