“I wanted to go work in a mine one time, and [my father] said, ‘If you do I’ll break your neck.’” –Joseph Dalpaiz, born 1904 in Helper, Utah
While mining attracted many Italian and other European immigrants, working in the mines was dangerous work. Remo Spigarelli says, “I had one brother and he was killed in a mine accident in 1941, at Hiawatha. The portal my dad opened. Ain’t that a coincidence?” Joseph Dalpaiz’s father worked in the Castle Gate mines, where an explosion in 1924 killed 172 miners. Between 1914 and 1929, Utah’s fatality rate in the mines was twice the national average. Ralph Fossat’s two-year-old son was hit by a mine cart, breaking his leg so badly that it nearly required amputation. Many coal miners suffered from black lung, an ailment caused by inhaling coal particles for years.
In addition to the dangers of mining, mine owners in Utah often tried to take advantage of a workforce composed primarily of immigrants. Coal miners were paid based on the weight of coal they produced, but check-weighmen hired by the company would often cheat the miners.1 Sometimes the weighman would switch the weight tags on coal carts, and some weighmen would guess based on sight.2 The practice of paying workers in “scrip” that could only be used to buy goods at inflated prices from a company store allowed mine owners to make back much of the miners’ wages. Remo Spigarelli says, “If you wanted to go to town you’d have to take the scrip over to the store, and they’d give you $4 [currency] for the $5 [scrip].” Miners sometimes had to provide their own tools. Spigarelli tells how a foreman asked if he owned a shovel. When he said no, the foreman said, "Then you can't work."
1920s sign from a mine in Tooele County with instructions in seven languages. From Utah Division of State History Preservation Department.
“The union came in 1933, which was a godsend to us. You know [United Mine Workers of America president] John L. Lewis is next to God, I’d say!”3 –Remo Spigarelli, born 1912 in Hiawatha, Utah
The narrators of these oral histories express gratitude for the labor unions in eliminating the use of scrip as payment, establishing fair weighing practices, and negotiating for better pay and shorter days. There was much competition between unions, and even union advocates acknowledge some of the faults of organized labor--Phil Notarriani recounts how the steelworkers union protected a worker who he believes should have been fired. But Notarriani says, “The unions did enact a change in the industry for good.” Unions advocated for compensation for injuries received on the job, and the narrators speak about how they and their relatives received pensions upon retirement after contracting black lung.
Labor organizing was difficult and contentious. Mine owners suppressed organizing efforts among their employees. Remo Spigarelli says, referring to his support of the union, “I can’t say what I feel, because it’s a no-no.” His father was asked to leave the company town of Hiawatha because he was a union member, and Spigarelli spread union pamphlets in secret. Tony Frugni was kicked out of his housing for talking about the union, and had to meet in secret with other organizers. Providing housing for workers in company towns was one way that mine owners combatted union organizing.
Mother Jones, famous for organizing coal miners in West Virginia, came to support the Carbon County strike of 1903-1904. When officials sympathetic to mine owners got Jones quarantined because of a supposed infection, a Carbon County deputy tried to rob her.4 The “pest house” where Jones was staying burned down, which Joseph Dalpaiz believes was the result of arson.
Italian Vice Consul Fortunato Anselmo visits Castle Gate with priests after 1924 mine explosion. Marriott Library.
“The life of the community was the workers.” –Phil Notarriani, PhD, born 1948 in Salt Lake City
Once unions were established, miners had to be prepared to sustain themselves without wages while striking. Tony Frugni tells of a strike that lasted for seven months, during which the union members only received a few dollars from the United Mine Workers. Striking required support from the entire community. Phil Notarriani tells how his father, a shoemaker, would repair the shoes of miners for free during strikes. Merchants would extend credit to strikers. By the time Notarriani worked at Kennecott Copper in the 1960s, many Italians were still leaders in the mining unions in Magna even though Italians were a small percentage of the workforce. While women did not work in the mines, they were essential to the success of labor organizing. Many women marched with their husbands in the 1903 strike in Carbon County. When Mother Jones came to Helper to support the strike, women hid her from company thugs.5
