Dan Sigurd Graham

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In Norse mythology and legend, Sigurd was a warrior born of the Danish royal family and was said to be a direct descendant of the god Odin, the warrior god signified by the Raven.

It is said in Norse legend that Sigurd slew the dragon Fafnir, and when he roasted and ate the dragon’s heart, he was able to understand the language of the birds around him.

A descendant Norse and winemaker, Dan Sigurd Graham, is alive today due to what he says was his great grandfather’s luck.

Dan’s great grandfather, Sigurd, travelled to Australia as a 19 year old to find work around 1914 and found the quickest way to become a citizen back then was to join the army.

Sigurd went to fight in the First World War, but was caught AWOL (absent without official leave) after being shot and was sent back to the front lines in France as punishment. Unfortunately, and somewhat ironically after trying to avoid being shot again, he was shot again, this time in the elbow.

“My great grandfather, Sigurd, came across just before the first world war in 1914,” Graham said.

“He wanted to settle but at the time he could not, and by joining the war effort he was given his citizenship and sent back to Europe where he survived the war, then he was sent back to the Riverland as a part of the resettlement of soldiers.

“As you did at the time, you grew stone fruit. Sigurd had some vines and generally worked on the land.”

Luckily for Dan, Sigurd survived the war, despite being shot twice, so he returned home to Australia.

When Dan was growing up in Yenda, a small country town in southern New South Wales, he crushed his first grapes quite young at his family’s winery.

“I grew up with wine in the blood really. We lived on a small property in the middle of very large vineyards, which during harvest used to wake us all up as the tractors and harvesters were picking the grapes,” he said.

“I used to draw pictures of wineries, tractors and vineyards. We also owned a small winery (in Griffith terms, crushing up to 6,000 tonnes) for a while when I was between 7 and 16. It was a great time.”

When he was old enough, Dan started off his career by working for some larger wine producers before ferrying off to university to study a double degree in winemaking and viticulture in Wagga Wagga.

Once he graduated, Dan did some extensive travelling through Europe and northern America – through France, Italy, Portugal, Canada and closer to home in New Zealand. After returning home to Australia following his time exploring the world, much like a Norse used to, albeit with much less raiding and pillaging, Dan completed an Advanced Wine Assessment Course.

“It was a pretty easy choice for me as I was heavily influenced by what my father did and the experiences in the winery when I was younger really solidified my passion for the industry,” he said.

Dan remarked that growing up in wine country when your family owns and operates a winery he had to lend a helping hand or two.

“When your parents have a winery in the 90s, you need to get to work! I remember my first jobs for Dad were putting caps on bottles on the bottling line where the bottles constantly fell over – I was about 10 I think.

“The other jobs I had were sorting through the over carbonated sparkling wine bottles in the crates, if they didn’t explode, we kept them, and if they did, well, we didn’t.

“My first real experience was just out of high school when I was 17 and worked for a very large winery, now called Casella. It was a massive growth period for them and without a huge amount of infrastructure to process, we had to work long hours and seven days a week, which was a big jump from casual work during school to almost three months straight of 12-hour days, and doing two and a half months of nightshift. I think that was back in 2003.

“It was a tough gig for an 18 year old,” he said, “I was given a lot of responsibility and we needed to get a lot done in a very small amount of time”.

“I probably knew then that I was meant to work in this profession.”

Dan says that, much like the Vikings of old passed knowledge on from one another by telling stories, one of the main lessons he learned growing up and working in wine was to listen to those around him and learn what he could.

“You think you know everything as a young man, but really you don’t know anything,” he jested.

“Trust your palate and back yourself with reasoning. If you are wrong, don’t be discouraged.

“This was really important when working as a young winemaker,” he recalled, “It took me a while to find my voice but was definitely happy to get there with encouragement from more senior winemaking figures.”

Then, in 2012, after working for Casella, Dan started his own label, Sigurd Wines.