Pier Giorgio Frassati was born in 1901 into a wealthy and influential family in Turin, Italy. His father was a journalist who directed a leading newspaper and was also a politician.

While studying engineering, he was active in the Catholic student movement and the St. Vincent de Paul Society, quietly visiting and helping the poor in their homes. He was a lay Dominican and loved climbing mountains with his friends. He died suddenly of polio in 1925 at twenty-four; it is said that many of the poor he had helped came to his funeral, to his family's surprise. He was canonized in 2025.