Sheldon ‘Hack’ Wilson; Bottler, Hotelier, Winery Owner
Sheldon S. “Hack” Wilson, who bottled soft drinks around the world, brewed beer, operated restaurants and luxury hotels and capped his career by creating the tiny Napa Valley winery Chimney Rock, has died. He was 85.
Wilson, who spent the last two decades of his life trying to “demystify” wine, died Sunday at the Cape Dutch-style mansion he built in Napa’s Stag’s Leap district.
Already a wealthy and accomplished businessman in 1980, Wilson created Chimney Rock Winery by purchasing an 18-hole golf course on the Silverado Trail and planting Bordeaux grapes on half of it. He might have converted the entire course, he often said, if he didn’t enjoy playing golf so much.
Former Times wine writer Robert Lawrence Balzer, visiting the winery shortly after its first vintage releases in 1986, called Chimney Rock “one of the newest jewels in the Napa Valley diadem,” praised its cabernet sauvignons, merlots and cabernet francs, and concluded that Wilson “has reason for pride.”
Wilson had asked experts where to buy his acreage (Napa) and hired former Charles Krug manager Peter Nissen to plant his vines and wine master Philip Togni to make his lauded reds. But beyond creating a fine product, Wilson also wanted to make adult consumers as comfortable with--and ready to reach for--wine as beer or Pepsi-Cola.
“We’ve got to put the glass or bottle of wine on the table, right there with the hamburgers, pizzas and tacos,” he told The Times in 1990.
Eschewing tony but intimidating slogans of other wineries as “blathering gibberish,” Wilson suggested a slogan more egalitarian such as: “It’s always time for wine . . . the civilized refreshment.”
Born in New York City and educated at New York University, Wilson began his career as a buyer for department stores before serving in the Army Air Forces Bomber Command, rising to major, in World War II.
He later spent three decades in South Africa, where he established 23 Pepsi-Cola plants in 19 African countries, and was involved in the brewing and hotel industries. He also had giant independent Pepsi bottling franchises in Los Angeles, Mexico City and Puerto Rico.
From 1964 to 1966 Wilson served as president of New York-based Rheingold Corp., a brewer and beverage conglomerate. He remained consultant and board member for beverage firms in the United States, Canada and South Africa, and through the 1970s bought and developed hotels in New York and Acapulco, as well as the 500-room Los Angeles Airport Hotel.
In 1986, with his brother Irwin, Wilson purchased the Good Earth health-food restaurant chain.
In addition to the Napa Valley vineyard and mansion, Wilson had maintained a home in Beverly Hills since 1965.
He is survived by his wife, Stella; children Leigh of Westport, Conn., Cary of Los Angeles and Drue-Ann of Sausalito, Calif.; his brother, Irwin, of San Juan Capistrano; and two grandchildren.
Cary Wilson said services will be private, and asked that any memorial donations be made to the Hospice of Napa, 3299 Claremont Way, Napa, CA 94558.
