The American Vineyard Foundation (AVF) and National Restaurant Association Educational Foundation (NRAEF) have reached an
agreement for the AVF to manage the André Tchelistcheff & Dr. Richard Peterson Scholarship funds for students studying Viticulture and Enology in the University of California system.
The André Tchelistcheff scholarship was created in 1988 by the National Restaurant Association (NRA) using proceeds from their annual Monterey Wine Festival “Big Bottle” Wine Auction and to date has awarded nearly $229,000 in scholarships. In 2005, the NRA created the Dr. Richard Peterson Scholarship for Viticulture and Enology.
André Tchelistcheff is cited by many as California’s most influential winemaker of the 20th century. From 1938 to 1973, while at Beaulieu Vineyard, Tchelistcheff changed the face of wine-growing in California, and influenced countless winemakers in the process. Tchelistcheff passed away in 1994 at the age of 92.
“He loved the challenges of consulting with today’s generations in the wine industry, making the last 18 years some of the happiest times of his life, said his widow Dorothy Tchelistcheff.” “He was much honored that a scholarship was set up in his name to help those entering the field of Viticulture and Enology.”
“The Tchelistcheff scholarship program provided me with support during a pretty financially challenging time while in graduate school preparing for a wine industry career,” said Nancy Irelan, PhD, currently the research director for the California’s Dept. of Food & Agriculture’s Pierce’s Disease/Glassy-Winged Sharpshooter Board. “I’ll never forget my first opportunity to participate in
the Monterey Wine Festival. It reaffirmed my decision to stay with this industry and build my career in winegrowing research.”
Dr. Peterson, well known in the California wine industry, was technical director at Gallo for almost ten years before becoming the winemaker at Beaulieu in 1968. He went on to start The Monterey Vineyard in 1974 and retired as chairman of Folie a Deux Winery. Peterson is credited with inventing many winemaking tools often seen in wineries today, such as barrel pallets and stackers.
“I was very surprised when I received a call from the NRAEF Board announcing that they had enough funds to start another scholarship and that they wanted to name it in my honor,” said Dr. Peterson. “My hope is that the scholarship can expand on the viticulture work of André, who, although often known only for his winemaking, loved working in the vineyards and truly believed that great wines started there. Andre married Viticulture and Enology together beautifully.”
Dr. Richard Peterson was the scholarship chairman in the past for the André Tchelistcheff Scholarship, and he coordinated the administration of the program for the first twenty years. While Dr. Peterson will remain on the scholarship committees for a few more years, the AVF has accepted his request to assume the responsibility of managing administration of the program for both scholarships into the future.
Both scholarships will accept application letters in May each year, with application reviews taking place in July and scholarship awards announced in August. More details and application forms will be available on the AVF Web site www.avf.org.
Established in 1978 to raise funds for research in viticulture and enology, the AVF is a wine-industry sponsored non-profit organization funded by growers and vintners. Since its founding, the AVF has funded over $18 million in wine- and grape-related research. For a complete listing of the funded research projects or more information regarding the AVF, check out their Web site at
www.avf.org.
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