After the Civil War and the assassination of President Lincoln, America went through a period of political, social, and economic unrest. However, this was also a time of innovation as manufacturing became more advanced, the first Transcontinental Railroad was completed, and Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone.

In Burlington, Iowa in 1866, writer and politician G.M. Todd and dentist H. Bailey formed H. Bailey & Co., a retail furniture business that set up shop in a large brick building near the Mississippi River. In 1875, a traveling salesman named Henry W. Chittenden joined the company,  introducing the Square mattress brand five years later. This brand was known as “the cleanest, most healthful, and most luxuriant mattresses ever made.”

A young bookkeeper named Edward P. Eastman became Chittenden’s business partner in 1883, and Chittenden & Eastman was born.