The Apgars and the Cider Press

Unearthed artifacts suggest that the Celts in Britain made hard cider or cider from crab apples in 3,000 BCE, but it was the Greeks and Romans who perfected the art of cider in 55 BCE.*

In the USA, fermented cider is often called hard cider to differentiate alcoholic from non-alcoholic versions. Apple cider is simply raw juice that has not been filtered. Hard cider is made with added yeast, which converts the natural sugar into alcohol.**

Apgar’s Cider Press, in Harmony, was first opened under a different name nearly 100 years ago, in 1924, by the Smith brothers. They began selling their fresh local cider at a small roadside stand on what was then a dirt road (now Harmony-Brass Castle). Ellis Apgar purchased the business from his brothers-in-law in 1952 when it went up for sale, and he and his wife, Ethel Smith Apgar, found themselves in the cider-making business. In 1986, Ellis and Ethel’s son, Alan, and his wife, Joan, took over the operation.

Photo of Ellis Apgar, taken in 1976. Photo courtesy of the Apgar family.

Always a family business, Joan Apgar is the current owner (Alan passed away in 2013) and runs Apgar’s Cider Press with the help of her daughter, Cindy Gilmore.

Covering 23 acres, the orchards produce peaches, sour cherries, and 15 varieties of apples. Joan explained that 2020 wasn’t a great growing season because of a deep-freeze in May, but that didn’t stop the (apple) presses! Apgar’s cider is made from a special blend of apples to assure its sweet, crisp, distinctively fresh flavor – a liquid rendering of crunchy apple-ness. There are no additives, preservatives, sugar, cinnamon or salt added to the pure cider.

Apgar’s doesn’t offer pick-your-own options, but there’s a nice-size store, expanded from the original road-side stand, which carries a wide assortment of country-style decor, jams and jellies, apples, peaches (in season), farm fresh eggs, and, of course, plenty of fresh-pressed cider. Visitors are invited to view (from a safe distance) the cider-making process on Saturdays at 9:30 am.

The process of making cider is fairly simple, but certainly labor intensive. Apple harvesting begins in September – by October it’s in full swing. Two to three bushels of apples are picked off one tree to press. They go through a brush machine where they’re washed, any residue wiped off, and leaves removed. At this point, the blemish-free, big apples are set aside for sale at the stand, while the smaller bruised ones head to the grinder.

The cider press at Apgar’s. Photo by Cathy Miller.

A belt outside the cider press room moves the apples through water, scooping them up, transporting them to the top of the building where they drop into the grinder, and are turned into pulp in mere seconds. The pulp is dumped into cloths where a hydraulic pump pushes it up, forcing it through a lattice rack, while the juice drips from the bottom to be caught below, free of any chunks or stems.

The resulting liquid is piped from the press through the Cider-Sure machine to kill any bacteria, then to the cold storage tank where the cider is hand-poured into hand-labeled gallon and half-gallon jugs. Finally, it’s capped, refrigerated and ultimately sold to appreciative consumers.

Joshua Pensack bottles fresh cider. Photo by Cathy Miller.

Locals often pick up the apple pomace (the pulp that remains after milling and pressing) for their pigs, to add to dairy feed, or to put out for deer. Once it dries, it can be used as fertilizer.

In 1974, Joan’s father-in-law Ellis Apgar starred in a short educational film entitled “The Cider Maker” (view here!). Ellis is heard saying, “The cider we make here – grind the apples, press it, let it run through the barrel and then put it in the jug – we don’t add anything to it.” He closed the film by noting how his children and grandchildren have always helped out at the business: “Families should be close together.”

There’s only one month remaining to snag a couple jugs of Apgar’s cider and enjoy the lusty fall libation. Their season will end on December 5 when the cider press shuts down until apple harvest begins next September.