When Lake Report journalist Jill Troyer sat down with Paul-Andre Bosc in 2022 to learn more about Château des Charmes, then still a family-run winery, she quickly realized the story of his father, Paul Bosc Sr., was far too big for a newspaper article.
“‘There’s too much there,’” she thought.
The Niagara-on-the-Lake writer has turned that into her first book, “The Winemaker’s Gamble,” launching Sept. 26 at the Niagara-on-the-Lake Museum as part of Ontario Culture Days.
“I literally think my jaw dropped,” Troyer said. “You can’t make this up. It’s such an amazing story.”
Published by Mosaic Press, the book tells the life of Bosc Sr., a fifth-generation French-Algerian winegrower, who left Algeria during the war in 1962 and later carried out Ontario’s first commercial planting of vinifera grapes.
After arriving in Montreal with zero English, Bosc Sr. worked at the Société des alcools du Québec — the provincial liquor board, similar to the LCBO — before phoning Chateau-Gai in Niagara Falls to point out faults he had noticed in its wines.
The call led to a job offer.
“There were a few steps along the way,” said Troyer, including time in Toronto to learn English before starting work at the plant in Niagara.
In 1978, he founded Château des Charmes and, around that time, planted vinifera grapes.
“Ontario wine had a terrible (wine) reputation,” she said, explaining that growers relied on Labrusca grapes, which survived the winters but produced poorer-quality wine compared to vinifera.
European varieties, such as Merlot, Chardonnay, Pinot Noir and Cabernet Franc, were thought unlikely to survive the climate — but Bosc, trained in both viticulture and oenology, was convinced otherwise and planted 50 acres.
Many in the industry dismissed the move as unrealistic.
Yet, within roughly a decade, his vineyards were thriving — the wine industry had begun shifting toward vinifera.
Troyer is an award-winning journalist and carries more than 50 honours in broadcast and print.
She holds an advanced Wine and Spirit Education Trust Level 3 certification and writes regularly about Niagara’s wine industry for The Lake Report — where she encountered the story.
It was during that work that a conversation with Bosc Jr. led to months of interviews with him and his father, who died in December 2023 at age 88.
Troyer is grateful to have shown Bosc Sr. early chapters before he died.
“Because I really wanted it to be true to his voice and his spirit,” she said.
“I think his story was untold because he was not a boastful man, he was very quiet,” she added.
“He just went about his business.”
His wife, known as Madame, “was quite a character herself,” Troyer said, known around town for teaching French in schools for decades.
“I think she taught everybody in the area,” she said.
She finished writing in 2024 and, after signing with a publisher that fall, spent the months leading up to March adding context and research before the book was complete.
It all came together during a difficult period for Troyer, who was diagnosed with cancer that same month while preparing the book for publication.
She underwent surgery in April and radiation treatment in August. “It’s been a lot,” said Troyer.
But the project also brought light back into a hard time.
“It definitely brought something positive and a focus that I had to get up and do in the morning,” she said.
She even remembers sending her publisher a manuscript file just hours after surgery. “It’s such a good story, and it’s also an important story,” Troyer said.
“To me, it’s a privilege to be able to write it.”
Troyer has lived in NOTL for about a decade — she’s proud to share such a locally rooted story with her community, she said.
The sale of the winery last year is just part of its ongoing story, she said — one she wrote about in the book.
Her launch event takes place Sept. 26 at the museum from 3 p.m. until 5, where the book will be available for purchase and signing.
It’s also available now, in a special early release from the publisher.
She is also scheduled to appear at the “Learn & Live” series at the Niagara-on-the-Lake Public Library on Nov. 18 and beginning Nov. 20, readers can purchase copies from Amazon, Indigo and other retailers.
The book has also been recognized within the Canadian publishing industry, included in Quill & Quire’s list of ‘exciting’ fall releases, she said.
For Troyer, sharing Bosc Sr.’s untold story means ensuring NOTL remembers the gamble that built Ontario’s wine industry.
