By Lauren Coodley and Paula Amen Judah, with the Napa County Historical Society

Napans tend more than grapevines. The area’s diverse soil and mild climate make possible a generous yield of agricultural products. This book traces the cultivation of these products through a chronology of Napa’s farming history, from indigenous food plants to the orchards that were planted to feed gold miners — orchards that would soon function as both therapy and sustenance for the patients in the newly created Asylum. Immigrants from Italy and Germany and Japan and China joined newly emancipated slaves and Mexican citizens who had settled here before the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Together they cultivated the land, picked the fruit, nuts, and hops, cut the wheat, kept bees, and tended livestock on dairy farms and cattle ranches.

REVIEWS