Lichine, Alexis (1913–89), was born in Russia but, unlike André tchelistcheff, another Russian who was to shape the American wine industry, he and his family left before the Revolution, and he was educated in France.
After the Repeal of prohibition, Lichine sold wines, first in a shop in New York and subsequently for the gifted American wine importer Frank schoonmaker. After the Second World War, in which he served with distinction, he returned to finding French and German wines from individual estates and selling them in an America where wine was all but unknown.
