Summary

Baldasare is an Italian immigrant who has just arrived in Fresno, California. At age thirty-two, he has traveled from the east coast to California in hopes of transforming the 70-acre parcel of land, that he had purchased, into a thriving vineyard. The advertisement, from which he learned of the land that he ultimately purchased, promised fertile land with year-round sunshine, free from the dangers of frost.

Baldasare's lone talent is that he is able to dig. As a boy in Italy, he worked alongside his brothers in their father's orchard. When he arrived in America, he dug tunnels in New York City and Boston. To Baldasare, digging is an honorable – even holy – task, and it is what sustains him.

Baldasare arrives in Fresno in the summer of 1905 with only his shovel, pick, some clothes and a meager supply of provisions. He...