The Hidden Bed

QUESTION: My husband and I recently purchased an older home. After we closed the sale, we discovered a Murphy bed in one of the smaller bedrooms. Though the bed needs some refurbishment and a new mattress, it’s seems to be in working order. Can you tell me more about Murphy beds and perhaps how old this bed might be.

ANSWER: Murphy beds have been around since the early 20th century. They have been made continuously by various companies, so it’s difficult to tell how old your bed is.

The Industrial Revolution brought with it lots of innovative ideas for convertible furniture, but it wasn’t until immigrants began arriving in greater numbers in the latter part of the 19th century that some of these came into common use. Whole families often had to live in one room—eating, relaxing, and sleeping in the same space—so that they needed furniture that served dual purposes. Beds stand out as the primary convertible piece of furniture most wanted by urban dwellers at the time. 

By the late 18th and early 19th centuries, the rolling trundle bed had become a common piece of furniture in homes. This large rectangular box rolled under high bedsteads for storage during the day. At night, an adult or child would pull on a rope and drag the bed out for sleeping.

A Murphy bed, on the other hand—also called a wall bed, pull down bed, fold-down bed, or hidden bed—is one that’s hinged at one end to store vertically against the wall, or inside of a closet or cabinet.

William Lawrence Murphy invented the Murphy Bed around 1900 in San Francisco. Legend says that he was falling for a young opera singer and courting customs at that time wouldn’t permit a lady to enter a gentleman’s bedroom. His invention allowed him to stow his bed in his closet, transforming his one-room apartment from a bedroom into a parlor.

Murphy then formed the Murphy Bed Company and patented his “In-A-Door” bed in 1908. He never trademarked the name “Murphy Bed.” 

Earlier fold-up beds had existed and were even available through the Sears Catalog, but Murphy introduced pivot and counterbalanced designs for which he received a series of patents. 

In 1911, William L. Murphy filed a patent for what he called his “disappearing bed.” His innovative design enabled a person to convert a bedroom to a sitting room by folding the bed back into a chifforobe-style cabinet mounted to the wall. 

Most Murphy beds don’t have box springs. Instead, the mattress usually lies on a platform or mesh, held in place so as not to sag when in a closed position. The mattress is often attached with elastic straps to hold the mattress in position when the unit is folded upright.

One of the most unique hideaway beds was the convertible piano bed from 1885. This piece could be placed in the family’s parlor and by day the room would look stylish and functional as not everyone could even afford a piano. Then by night it was a bed, affording a large family more flexibility with their sleeping arrangements. Later Murphy beds catered to the poor, but early versions may have appealed to middle and upper classes as curiosities.

Sarah Goode, the co-owner of a furniture store in Chicago with her carpenter husband, filed a patent in 1885 a patent for a “cabinet bed,” more commonly known as a “bed in a box.” Goode’s customers often complained that they liked the furniture she and her husband sold but simply didn’t have anywhere to put it in their small, urban homes.

So Goode set about inventing a folding cabinet bed that when not in use looked like a desk standing against the wall. Goode’s design was far more elaborate than a bed-in-a-box. Her folding bed unit had hinged sections that were easily raised or lowered by an adult.

Essentially, when the user folded the cabinet down, it changed shape revealing a bed. The concept wasn’t new since other manufacturers had developed “hideaway” beds that could be found in early Sears catalogs. Many of the manufacturers of these pieces had factories in Indiana. 

Unlike Murphy beds or piano beds, Goode’s cabinet bed was movable and short in stature, allowing for a safer experience and ease in moving the bed around the room. Upright hideaway beds need to be fixed to the wall so that they didn’t topple over, but cabinet beds could be freestanding.

Another feature that separated Goode’s design from all but the piano bed was that her roll-top cabinet desk-bed was actually a functional desk, with working storage and a writing surface to be accessed when not in bed form. It isn’t known if Goode’s furniture company made these beds or if she licensed her patent to other furniture makers. However, an existing cabinet-desk-bed from the era doesn’t mention anything about Goode or her patent, instead it bears the label of A.H. Andrews & Company, based in Chicago, that claim to be the sole manufacturer of such a bed.

Today both new and antique Murphy beds are quite costly, most selling for at least $1,200 to $1,500 for either.

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