An Electrical Engineer of twenty eight years with Lockheed Martin, Michael von Heckler began his journey of winemaking in 1977 at a Les Amis du Vin in Greenvale, New York. There Serena Sutcliffe, MW spoke on Champaign and instilled a life long desire to achieve Master Winemaker certificate and diploma, which Michael did in 1995 under Mary Ewing-Mulligan, MW, in the WSET diploma program in NYC at the International Wine Center and then with Ian Mitchell at the Liquor Control Board of Ontario in Toronto.

He first began making wine on an amateur basis. Having been exposed to great wines of Bordeaux, et. al. He made wine only from vitis vinifera and purchased grapes from well known areas, such as long Island and California. All of the grapes were purchased directly from the growers. He was awarded numerous medals for his wine from Intervin, American Wine Society and others.

In 1996 Michael discovered that just across the Canadian border in Ontario there is a large wine industry located adjacent to an age old limestone plat/outcropping, know as the Niagara Escarpment. The industry is still growing with over 7000 employees in the vineyard, winery and tourism related businesses. He had noticed that the escarpment continued on the United States side of Niagara River and asked himself,

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