CONSERVATION

Chuck and Anne Shelton of Abermarle Ciderworks
Tom Burford
cidermaking in the mid-1990s. She sought out
the best American and English cidermakers
as teachers, planted rare but richly-flavored
heirlooms such as the Harrison, and refined
a business plan and distribution strategy that
already gets her fine heirloom apple ciders out
to over one hundred and seventy taverns, pubs,
restaurants and specialty shops in four states.
Along with Chuck and Charlotte Shelton,
Flynt helped convince their state governor
to sponsor Virginia Cider Week, which has
exposed thousands of the uninitiated to the
realization that apples are as good to drink as
they are to eat. Now in its second year, Cider
Week features dozens of tastings, pairings,
dinners and lectures that not only promote the
Harrison, but other rare apples such Ashmead’s
kernel, Graniwinkle, Roxbury russet and
Hewe’s Virginia crab. While Harrison is now
back in cultivation as far north as Maine, and
as far west as Wyoming, roughly 81% of the
3000 apple varieties still being offered by
one or more North American nurseries is still
considered endangered. The Harrison may
have survived, but perhaps as many as 15,000
other apple varieties named and historically
grown in the U.S. did not.
The hope among cider apple historians like
Ben Watson is the renaissance of hard cider
in America will keep many other heirloom
apples from falling out of cultivation and off
our tables. Watson, an apple grower, former
co-chair of the U.S. Ark of Taste committee and
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