Italian immigration was one of the largest influxes of southern and eastern European groups into Utah. While some Protestant Waldensians from northern Italy had immigrated in the 1870s after being converted by the Mormon missionary program, the bulk of Italians came to Utah during the period from the 1890s to the 1920s in response to demands for unskilled labor in the mining and railroad industries.

Italians came primarily from the regions of Piemonte, Veneto (Tyroleans), Abruzzi, Lazio (Romans), Calabria, and Sicilia. Immigrants mainly were attracted to four counties, Carbon, Salt Lake, Tooele, and Weber. Coal mining, metal mining, work in mills, smelters, and refineries, railroading, farming and ranching, and involvement in service-related industries and businesses provided livelihoods for these immigrants.