Mokcsai Haraszthy Ágoston, the first Hungarian known to have settled in USA, wrote books in three languages and spoke at least five. He made bricks and built mills, kept farm animals, laid out towns, operated steamboats and stagecoaches, raised corn and orchards... It's actually easier to tell you what he did not do: he did not play the theremin, mainly because it hadn't been invented yet.
Other than this, Mr. Harasthy did everything with varying degrees of success. Curiously, while his successes during his life time were all temporary, after he died most of the things he pioneered thrived and flourished.

Mr. Haraszthy claimed to have received his commission in the Royal Hungarian Guards of Francis I, Emperor of Austria-Hungary in 1830, and, after his service, became County Lord Lieutenant and delegate to the Diet in Pozsony. During his time in the Diet, he developed a close friendship with Transylvania reformer, Baron Wesselényi, and future revolutionary hero, Lajos Kossuth, both of whom were arrested for treason in 1837. There is little evidence of any of this beyond his own statements.

Taking these arrests as a sign to travel he went to Europe, New York, and Washington, where, in 1841, he became acquainted with Daniel Webster and President Tyler.
During his travels he found time to write the second book about US in Hungarian.

After some additional travel he settled in Wisconsin, founded the oldest incorporated village in the state, strangled a wolf with his bare hands, brought over his entire family, and planted a vineyard.

People say that he moved from Wisconsin to California to avoid debt. It is all slander. He moved to improve his health and to plant vineyards.

As wagon master he led a train of 60 immigrants by a southerly route to San Diego in 1850, instantly growing its population by 10%.
Mr Haraszthy (despite having been called Count and Coronel he was neither) started his California stay by running in California's first American election to become the first town marshal and the first sheriff of San Diego. Agoston Haraszthy appointed Richard Freeman as his deputy marshal, making Freeman the first African American lawman in California.

In the same first election Charles Haraszthy, Agoston's father, became Magistrate and Land Commissioner.


Subsequently, and with no conflict of interest whatsoever, as private contractor, Agoston Haraszthy built the first San Diego jail. As the jail opening was being celebrated, the first inmate, son of the Mayor, escaped by making a hole in the wall with a pocket knife (or, some claim, a spoon). He joined the celebrations and subsequently went on to become “Judge Roy Bean, the Only Law West of the Pecos”.

This was the second, improved and strengthened version of the jail, as the first one collapsed. In total the project cost over $7,500 and ruined San Diego financially to the extent that the City Charter was withdrawn.

Mr. Haraszhty also collected county taxes at Agua Caliente, causing a violent Native American uprising led by Antonio Garra and martial law in San Diego.
Impressed with this record, San Diegans elected Mr. Haraszthy to the State Assembly, where he led what I believe to be the first attempt to divide California into two states.

Today Mr Haraszthy is best known for his work in viniculture, being one of the first to plant grapes in Wisconsin and California.
Finding no success in the State Assembly he moved North and established the Crystal Springs winery on land owned by someone else. When the owner complained, Mr Haraszthy discovered the climate to be too foggy for grapes and concentrated on melting and refining gold.

He was appointed assayer to the first US Mint due to this experience in metallurgy. By 1855 he was promoted to melter and refiner, and by 1857 indicted on embezzlement charges of which, however, he was fully exonerated by 1861.

After the embezzlement charge Haraszthy largely abandoned San Francisco. He acquired the Buena Vista winery in Sonoma and hired Charles Krug as his winemaker. He popularized winemaking among Californians, marketed Californian wines in the East, dug California's first wine caves, and wrote "Report on Grapes and Wine in California", America's first explication of European winemaking methods.

In 1856 he was the first to bring to California Zinfandel, the grape most grown here.
In 1857 he planted 80,000 vines on about 118 acres more than tripling the wine acreage in Sonoma.
At the 1860 State Fair his wine won six first prizes.

In 1861 he was commissioned by the State Legislature to travel to Europe and collect grapevine specimens of every variety. He visited France, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Greece, Egypt, and Spain, bringing back many (claims vary from several hundred to over 100,000) cuttings of diverse varieties of grapes and other fruit plants. The legislature did not reimburse him. Some say it is because he was a Democrat and the Republican party was driving California at the time, but more likely it's because he was authorized to make observations, not purchases, and strictly warned that he would not be able to claim expenses. Haraszthy thought it was because of political machinations and proceeded to sell the cuttings himself.

Despite all of this, Mr. Haraszthy was elected as President of the California State Agricultural Society. He also found time to write a book, "Grape Culture, Wines, and Wine-Making" that remained a wine-making authority well into the 20th century.

To support his expenditures at the time Haraszthy sold off some of his vast real estate holdings, including a piece to Charles Krug, his neighbor in South San Francisco and co-worker at the mint. Krug opened the first tasting room in California. It, and the tasting room of the resurrected Buena Vista winery are very worth visiting if you can tear yourself away from San Francisco.

By 1863 Agoston Haraszhty's place in California society was so assured that two of his sons, Arpad and Attila, married daughters of General Vallejo. The generalheld vital roles in Californian politics under Spanish, Mexican, and American governments, marrying into his family meant you have arrived.
In the same year Haraszthy incorporated the Buena Vista Vinicultural Society, the first large corporation in USA organized for the express purpose of engaging in agriculture.
In 1864 Harper's Magazine claimed his winery, Buena Vista, to be the largest such establishment in the world.

But in 1866, due to an outbreak of phylloxera that destroyed Californian vineyards, Haraszthy was bankrupt. Shareholders of the Vinicultural Society blamed the death of grapes on his visionary (or, as some called it, mad) innovations and fired him for “extravagance and unfaithfulness”. They wanted a more traditional manager. Tradition, of course, is no match for phylloxera. By 1880, only one vine remained in Attila Haraszthy's Sonoma vineyard and the Buena Vista estate was seized for unpaid taxes.

Ironically, the French and German wine industry was later rescued from the same devastation when a blight-resistant root stock that Haraszthy had originally brought to America was transported from California back to Europe.

Haraszthy involved himself in politics, campaigning for the right of Chinese immigrants to work and African-Americans to vote. This did not help his financials, and in 1867 he declared bankruptcy.

It is not true that Mr Haraszthy moved to Nicaragua in 1868 to escape debts. He moved for his health.

In Nicaragua he he obtained from the government a monopoly to distill brandy and rum for 20 years, and proceeded to build a large sugar plantation. Little is known about his financials at the time.

In 1869 he left home alone on muleback and was never seen again. Haraszthy's family claimed that he fell while crossing a crocodile-infested jungle river on a tree branch and was swept out to sea, there to be killed by sharks. This is entirely believable, since crossing a crocodile-infested river on a tree branch would be difficult for most 77-year-olds. However, there were no witnesses to his death, and his body was never found, so many of his admirers (and creditors) continued for a long while to hold out hope for his return.