Tom Clark and Laurie Claudon met their shared love of viticulture through the Peace Corps before settling in Napa Valley in 1974, where Tom built his vineyard-management expertise working with Spottswoode and St. Supery. In 1989 the couple found an untouched 100-acre parcel on remote Howell Mountain, planting just 16 acres to vine and preserving the rest as natural habitat.