Chiriaco Summit: Built by Love to Last in the Desert

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Wine was free, but we had to pay for water.

Joe Chiriaco and his thirteen siblings heard this from their Italian immigrant father as he recounted his ocean journey to America. In the face of limited water and rudimentary dirt roads, Joe and his Norwegian wife, Ruth Bergseid, founded Chiriaco Summit in the 1930s, a desert travel oasis on today’s Interstate 10 between Phoenix and Los Angeles, promising to serve the world on wheels.

The twenty-four-seven challenges are lightened with the courtship of two feisty lovers, the frolicking of youngsters in the desert, more loves, and the juxtaposition of some very imposing personalities, including those of Joe Chiriaco and General Patton.

After moving through new aqueducts and highways, military camps, societal upheavals, and a welcome new set of hard-working immigrants, the twenty-first century brings provisions for electric cars, modern aircraft, and ATV facilities outside Joshua Tree National Park from whence the first Summit waters flowed.