Gallo, Ernest and Julio

Ernest (1909–2007) and Julio Gallo (1910–1993), although brought up in a grape-growing and wine-making family, did not start what is America’s largest wine empire until after the mysterious deaths of their parents in 1933. The Gallo family had continued to grow grapes throughout Prohibition for “home wine making,” and the murder-suicide—the official verdict of the deaths on 21 June 1933—has been shrouded with questions. The Prohibition era was a time of widespread lawlessness, and it would have been very difficult for a significant grape grower to have avoided contact with unsavory elements. This was especially true in California, where organized crime from the East Coast and Midwest was establishing itself in everything from film unions to clandestine alcohol production. The “accidental death” of the film star Thelma Todd in 1935 led to a great deal of unwanted publicity on this issue and on the corruption of many California institutions and industries.