Albert Seibel

Albert Seibel (1844 to 1936) was a French physician and viticulturist who made hybrid crosses of European wine grapes with native North American grapes, known as Seibel grapes. Born at Aubenas in the Ardèche in southern France, he worked during and after the phylloxera plague of the 1860s, which cut European wine production by more than two thirds, when crossing American stock with Vitis vinifera varieties was one of the promising ways to contain the disaster. The hybrids did not necessarily make better wine but gave vine stock that survived phylloxera better. Seibel and his company produced over 16,000 new hybrids, nearly 500 of them grown commercially, often using the hybrid Jaeger 70 as female parent. Well known Seibel grapes include Aurore, Chancellor, Chelois and De Chaunac. In 1895 he founded a school to teach grafting methods. His grapes were widely planted in France and Brazil.