Geyserville, California
Near Healdsburg, California
Geyserville takes its name from the geothermal springs in the Mayacamas Mountains a few miles to the east, which drew curiosity seekers in the eighteen fifties and supplied a small tourist economy in the form of bathhouses and hotels for visitors who believed the hot mineral water had healing properties. The town itself settled into a life of cattle, grain, and fruit, particularly prunes. Peter Young ran a ranch here beginning in eighteen fifty-eight, and in time his descendants replanted the orchard land with something that would prove far more lucrative.
By nineteen sixty-three, his grandson Robert Young had planted the Robert Young Vineyard in Alexander Valley, a move that helped ignite the California wine revolution of the nineteen seventies. Today the small downtown of Geyserville is surrounded by some of the most celebrated vineyards in Sonoma County, and the geysers that named it are now channeled into The Geysers geothermal power plant, the largest such facility in the world.
