Grayson College rededicates the Munson vineyard, a half-century into its wine program

By GvilleTX Newsroom

Grayson College and the Munson family held a rededication ceremony for the T.V. Munson Memorial Vineyard, according to the official Facebook account of state Rep. Shelley Luther, which said her staff attended. Those three acres of vines are the teaching ground for a grape-growing and winemaking program the college says it began in 1974, and they sit inside the same federal wine region that takes in Cooke County.

That region is the Texoma viticultural area, which the federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau established on Dec. 7, 2005 across Montague, Cooke, Grayson and Fannin counties. The name carries legal weight on a label. Texas House Bill 1957, effective Sept. 1, 2021, bars a wine from using a Texas viticultural area, county or vineyard name unless all the fruit was grown in Texas, for harvests from Jan. 1, 2022 forward. The Texas House bill analysis said lawmakers wanted the stricter standard to protect the image and the pricing power of Texas-grown wine.

Grayson describes the memorial vineyard as a learning tool for its students, planted with more than 65 original T.V. Munson varieties. The T.V. Munson Viticulture and Enology Center opened beside it in 1988, the college says. Munson developed more than 300 grape varieties and helped save the European wine industry by sending phylloxera-resistant rootstock from Denison to France, according to Grayson.

The college says the program was the first of its kind at a Texas community college and is among the few in the country granting degrees in grape growing and winemaking. Its catalog lists a 60-credit-hour associate of applied science degree, 17-credit enology and viticulture certificates and a 12-credit occupational skills award.

A 2015 report hosted by the Texoma Council of Governments, credited to Michael Hutchins of the Herald Democrat, attributed to Grayson President Jeremy McMillen the statement that the program dated to 1975 and had provided education to 108 of the 172 wineries then operating in Texas. The college's program page gives the start as 1974.

When regulators drew the Texoma boundary, the rulemaking record counted four wineries and roughly 55 acres of vines across a region of about 2.3 million acres. The Texas Department of Agriculture now calls Texas the fifth-largest wine-producing state.

By the numbers. Texas wine grapes: 14,180 tons from 5,020 bearing acres in 2019, up from 11,660 tons and 4,541 bearing acres in 2017; North Texas, 500 bearing acres and 680 tons in 2019 (USDA-NASS). Texas wine industry, 2025: 617 producers, 14,043 vineyard acres, 136,744 jobs and $24.39 billion in economic activity (WineAmerica). More than 400 wineries and eight viticultural areas statewide (Texas Department of Agriculture).

Other Texas institutions also offer viticulture and enology training. Palo Alto College announced a 60-credit-hour associate degree starting in spring 2020, Texas Tech University lists a bachelor's concentration and professional certificates, and Texas A&M AgriLife Extension runs certificate tracks for growers and wine producers.