"Varietal Wine Labeling" Alexis Lichine Signed FDC Dated 1952 For Sale

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"Varietal Wine Labeling" Alexis Lichine Signed FDC Dated 1952:
$99.99

Up for sale "Varietal Wine Labeling" Alexis Lichine Hand Signed First Day Cover Dated 1952. 

ES-1493

Alexis Lichine (December

3, 1913 – June 1, 1989) was a Russian wine writer and

entrepreneur. He played a key role in promoting varietal labelling of wine, was a masterful salesman of wine, and

owned Château Prieuré-Lichine and

a share of Château Lascombes in

the Médoc. He was married to actress Arlene Dahl from 1964 to 1969. Lichine was born in Moscow in 1913. His family fled to France during

the Russian Revolution of 1917,

going on to the United States in 1919. He studied economics at the University of Pennsylvania but

dropped out because he felt he wasn't learning anything.[ In

1932 Lichine moved back to Paris and accepted a sales position with The

New York Herald Tribune. In 1933 he continued in sales for The New

York Herald Tribune in Algiers, and in 1934 moved back to New attempted to start his own import wine company but failed, and in 1935

worked for the Cork and Bottle retail store in New York, and became a US citizen. He then went to work for Saccone and Speed, a New

York wine importer, and in 1938 he was hired by wine merchant Frank Schoonmaker as his national sales manager.[

On the outbreak of World War II, Lichine caught the last American ocean liner out

of Bordeaux, the S.S. Manhattan.[ During the war he

served in the United States Army Military Intelligence, in Europe and North

Africa and was discharged as a Major.[ He was given the

rank of Major by the commanding headquarters of the Delta Bar Section of the US

Military Intelligence. He was released at Fort Dix, New Jersey on April 18, 1946. He was awarded

the Order of Leopold, the

Belgium Bronze Star and the World War II recognition from the French Legion of Honor. On

his return from the war, Lichine asked for full partnership in the company.

Schoonmaker declined and Lichine left. In 1946 he went to work for the import

wine division of United Distillers of America. In 1947 he purchased a cotton farm in Jacks Bay in St. Croix. In the same year

he married the Countess Renee de Villeneuve in New York. In July 1948 he was

hired by Claude

Phillipe of the Waldorf Astoria New York hotel

to buy wines in Europe for them. The same year he was divorced from the

Countess. In 1949 Alexis hired Pierre de Wilde (from Château du Tertre) as his

assistant wine buyer. In 1950 Lichine became the export manager for Château Haut-Brion. In

1955 Lichine founded Alexis Lichine Negociants in Long Island City, New York.

He moved to Margaux to set up a shipping organization, Lichine &

Cie., which became a leading exporter of first quality wines. In 1951 Lichine

purchased Château Prieuré-Lichine and

in 1952 also became part owner and manager of Château Lascombes. In the

same year he started billboard advertising of his wine tasting room at the

Prieure. This was the first time in the wine industry that professional wine

tasting rooms were set up for the general public. In 1953 he purchased parcels

in Latricieres in Chambertin and Bonnes Mares in Chambolle-Musigny. In 1955 Alexis Lichine married Gisele

Edenbourgh. Their first child Alexandra was born in 1957. Their second child

Alexis Andrew Serge (Sacha) was born in 1960. In 1959 Lichine was a member of a

committee that unsuccessfully launched a offer to revise the Bordeaux

Wine Official Classification of 1855. Undeterred, Lichine

published his own Classification des Grands Crus Rouges de Bordeaux in

1962 and made several revisions in the following years while campaigning for

changes to a classification he contended was outdated. His efforts led him

to be referred to as "the doyen of unofficial classification

compilers". Lichine served as an expert taster in the New York Wine Tasting of

1973. In 1987, Lichine was chosen the "Man of the Year" by

the wine magazine Decanter. Alexis

Lichine died of cancer at Château Prieuré-Lichine on

June 1, 1989, aged 76. He was succeeded by his son Sacha (then aged 28), who

later moved to Switzerland and sold Prieure-Lichine in August 1999. In

2008, he was posthumously inducted into the Wine Writers' Hall of Fame by the

Wine Media Guild of New York.

"Varietal Wine Labeling" Alexis Lichine Signed FDC Dated 1952

$99.99

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