The Utah Territory was settled in 1847 by the Latter Day Saints.

Protestant churches in the United States believed that Mormons were not true Christians. Mormon rebellion against the federal government and the Mormon practice of taking multiple wives were especially troubling to Protestants.

Between 1865 and 1910, missionaries arrived from the Congregational, Episcopal, Presbyterian, Methodist, Roman Catholic, and Baptist denominations to establish missions and churches, predominantly in Salt Lake City, but spreading throughout the territory.

The First Methodist Episcopal Church is the only remaining Methodist church in Utah dating from this period of missionary work that continues as a Methodist church.

The building is architecturally significant as an example of an ecclesiastical style adopted by most Protestant denominations from 1880 to 1930.

Source: NRHP nomination submitted in 1994