Phylloxera vitifoliae, family Phylloxeridae, suborder Homoptera.
While growing succeeded there for decades, a plague of the plant louse phylloxera, followed by Prohibition and then the Depression, set the region back for years....
They had replanted their land with vines after the phylloxera disaster, until a glut of cheap wine flooded the market, and they could no longer sell their only product.
More important was the wine boom in Spain and Italy in the 1880s which took advantage of the phylloxera epidemic in France.
Origin
Mid 19th century: modern Latin, from Greek phullon 'leaf' + xēros 'dry'.