The news that Barney Rhodes, 88, of Rutherford, Napa Valley, has passed on to the great cellar in the sky (see a fine obituary on decanter.com) somehow marks the end of the era in which the winemakers of Napa Valley could be seen as an innocent, rural community of like-minded pioneers.
Barney and his wife Belle, who recently pre-deceased him, were, in the gentlest, most civilised way possible, the social glue, and often financial fabric, behind so much of Napa Valley’s burgeoning wine scene in the late 20th century. Although he was by profession a dermatologist (wrinkles did...