Appeared in the Spring/Summer 2024 Gazette
By Meagan McChesney, WHS Curator

We’ve all heard of the Murphy Bed, but did you know that a Winnetka resident created a folding bed forty years before William Murphy patented his design?

Sanford S. Burr, c. 1870s.

That inventive Winnetkan was Sanford S. Burr, namesake of our local Burr Avenue. Burr was born in Massachusetts in 1839. He attended college at Dartmouth, where he was still a student when the Civil War broke out. Burr felt called to serve and enlisted in the Union Army on June 20, 1862 as a captain with the Rhode Island Volunteers, 7th Squadron.

While relatively little is known about his short military service, records indicate that Burr was likely wounded in battle. He was mustered out of the Union Army after only three months.

Burr then returned to Dartmouth to finish his degree. While in school, he met and married a woman named Eliza J. Osgood on December 6, 1863 in Dunbarton, New Hampshire. Shortly after, the couple moved to Dedham, Massachusetts and over time, had four children: Carrie, Hermon, Mabel, and Frank.

While living in Massachusetts, Burr worked in the furniture business. Clearly inspired, he began drawing designs of household inventions and furniture. In 1868, he received a patent for the Burr Parlor Folding Bed, likely the first folding bed invented in the United States.

Original prototype for the Burr Folding Bed, c. 1868. This prototype is now located in the WHS archives.

Original prototype for the Burr Folding Bed, c. 1868.

The first prototype of the Burr Parlor Folding Bed was attractive yet flawed in its design. Burr designed the mattress to fold into a beautiful wooden faux cabinet, hiding its true purpose. It would have been ingenious if not for one problem – the wooden cabinet had to be pulled away from the wall and turned around in order to open the bed. Thankfully, by the time his invention hit the market, Burr had altered the design so that the bed folded out from the front of the faux cabinet with ease.

After receiving that first patent, Burr became a full-time inventor and furniture dealer, inventing creative designs such as a convertible crib-totable and a collapsible bathtub.

In 1880, the Burr family moved to Winnetka, purchasing the newly built house at 560 Elm. Burr continued his career as an inventor while becoming increasingly involved in Village government. He served as Village president from 1888 to 1891, and became the first president of the Winnetka Library Board. Burr’s oldest daughter, Carrie, married prominent Winnetkan Carleton Prouty. Notably, in 1932, she co-founded the Winnetka Historical Society.

Once their children were grown, Sanford and Eliza Burr spent more time at the family’s home in South Haven, Michigan. They eventually sold their house in Winnetka and moved to South Haven full-time. Shortly after, Burr’s health deteriorated, and he moved into the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He died in Milwaukee on July 20, 1901 and was buried near the family’s home in South Haven.

Thanks to Carrie Burr Prouty’s early involvement in the Winnetka Historical Society and her generous donations, WHS now houses several of Sanford S. Burr’s original patents. In addition, WHS is home to the first (flawed) prototype of the Burr Parlor Folding Bed, which he presented at the Philadelphia World’s Fair in 1876.

Sanford S. Burr’s first U.S. patent for the Burr folding bed, 1868. This patent is now located in the WHS archives.