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[Wallace]

O.K. you asked. The Celebration of Life party for Jerry was a huge success. The setting was on a tree covered hill over looking vineyards of the Alexander Valley on a warm spring day with a perfect breeze.
There were around twenty picnic tables, a huge bbq pit with a spit, tables for food and lots of wine. George Bursick (Ferrari-Carano Winery) and Mike Martini (L. Martini Winery) loaned the party a fantastic PA system and the Valley rocked with the blues.
Evidently those guys have a kick-ass Rock and Roll band that we'll have to get for next years Bobby Darin party. (For those who are not all that well acquainted with the Curmudgeon his birthday fell on the same day as Bobby Darin's and for 20 or more years we celebrated an annual Bobby Darin party at one restaurant or another. Jerry died about two weeks before his sixty first birthday this year but we still have a tradition to keep up starting next April.)

Anyway, a couple hundred people showed up and each and every one brought really good wine to drink plus many, many wineries sent cases of wine, some for auction and some for drinking. There were even people there who were dead set on making sure there were no wines left over. They're probably still up on the hill.

Numerous members of the wine press were in attendance and a couple reporters from the Santa Rosa Press Democrat were there. The PD reporters quoted Dan Berger as saying Jerry deserved the name "Curmudgeon" and probably was the only writer who could capture the "outrageous politics" of the wine industry.

Jerry's passing left a very large void with many friends whom he mentored and a very large and unpaid hospital bill, I mean he couldn't even get insurance when he was healthy, so we attempted to auction magnums, double magnums, old vintages dating all the way back to the fifties (from Dr. Peterson's and Louis Martini's personal cellars and many others) all donated by attendees to help offset some of those costs, but we ran out of time. Hard to tend to business and party as hardy as we were.

I would guess half the wines that showed up for that event are still left to be auctioned. For those of you who know him, Iggywine is in charge of that and will communicate times and wines after he gets settled into his new YOB.

Craig Goldwyn was there taking pictures and soon afterwards sent this note: I took some pictures at the Jerry Mead Celebration of Life, and I have posted them at http://spinography.com/mead/index.htm. You did a nice thing Jim.

Now, another thing. Jerry had a personal wine cellar that his lady will probably make available in the very near future. If any of you would like a list of those wines and would be interested in assisting her financially you need to send a note to me expressing your interest. In a way this presents a small problem in that many lawmakers and wholesalers around the country felt Jerry was the anti-christ and they continue to stifle efforts to trade and ship wines, so if you are interested, and were not one of Jerry's kids I can't help you.

For those interested I have a few fotos I took as well.