50. Joshua Maloney

Richland, Washington · Arts and Sciences

joshua@maloneywine.com

Tell us about what you're doing with your life.
I started working as a winemaker in the Finger Lakes shortly after graduation. A couple years later my wife Lisa and I moved to California where I worked in Napa and then Monterey for a number of years. In 2005 I took a winemaking job in Washington (state) and we had two lovely daughters, Fiona and Daphne. While I continue to make wine for others as well as work as a consulting winemaker, this year I am launching a label under my own name—it's very limited production and focuses exclusively on single vineyard Cabernet Sauvignon. If anyone wants to learn more about the wines, please visit maloneywine.com.

What was your favorite class at Cornell, or the one you found the most useful?
The obvious answer is "Introduction to Wines," not only because it was a really fun course and a fairly popular one (looking through the other entries on this site), but also because it is directly responsible for setting me on my current path.

Either that or my Freshman writing seminars, because they teached me to write gooder.

If you could change anything about your Cornell experience, what would it be?
I wish I had done more. At the time I remember lots of hard work as well as lots of fun, but now when I think about the time and opportunities I had to learn about and experience new things and it seems like an enormous luxury that I didn't truly appreciate.

What advice would you give to a student starting at Cornell this year?
Did you know that you can earn a degree in Enology from Cornell? That wasn't an option in 1995. So here's my advice—get that degree and I'll hire you when you graduate and/or offer you a harvest internship.