Sonoma Wineries and Vineyards: A Reference Blog

Chalk Hill Estate Vineyards and Winery

Chalk Hill’s potential as a world-class wine estate began eons ago in the geologic timeline that lifted, folded, fractured, and weathered this terrain on the slow march to terroir.

Grape growing on Chalk Hill began by the 1860s with the first pioneering family to homestead this land, Sarah and John Rich. After John’s death Sarah married widower Lorenzo D. Latimer, a successful local lawyer, whose lofty legal duties often drew him away from the ranch. Sarah invested her sturdy spirit in their successful family farm, and their Glen Valley Resort developed by the family around the natural hot springs – the vestiges of which are at Chalk Hill. In the early 1900s, travelers and the San Francisco elite, made the full day rail-and-wagon journey to share the bucolic calm of its healing waters.

One of Latimer’s sons, Lorenzo P. Latimer, grew to appreciate the vistas and redwoods, becoming a renowned landscape artist. A special collection of Latimer paintings are on display at the Chalk Hill Winery and others are on loan to art exhibitions in California.

Link to Chalk Hill Estate Vineyards and Winery