Salt Lake Mattress Building, 535 W 300 South

Salt Lake Mattress & Mfg. Co. truck. Image from UDSH.

Then (1907) & Now (2019). The Salt Lake Mattress Manufacturing Co. Building (later called the Serta Mattress Factory building) is located at 535 W. 300 South SLC, behind the Rio Grande Depot. 

The building was built in 1907 (county records incorrectly state 1930) by Headlund and Wood architects and is still standing after selective demolition by the SLC RDA of surrounding buildings. The SLC RDA currently owns the building but does not have any specific plans for its future.

Mr. Frederick Eberhardt, president of the Salt Lake Mattress & Mfg Co, came to SLC in 1900 from Kansas and started the business in 1901. The factory made all kinds of mattresses including hair, moss, elastic cotton felt, kapok or silk floss, cotton, wool, and woven wire and coil springs.

Historic newspaper source: Truth, 28 September 1907, page 14.

Salt Lake Mattress & Manufacturing Co, 1907. Image from UDSH.

Salt Lake Mattress building Dec 2019

Goodwin's Weekly Dec 11 1909

Christmas Eve 1919

Throwback to Christmas 1919, Little Bobby Jensen hangs his stocking in his Salt Lake home. Photo clipped from The Salt Lake Tribune December 22 1919.

Holiday Shopping from the Sears Roebuck Catalog, 1919

100 years ago, holiday shopping could be done through mail order through Sears Roebuck. Here are some choice gifts from the 1919 Fall Sears Roebuck and Co Catalog. 

Warning: some items are racist by today's standards. Digital images from Sears Roebuck catalog via Ancestry.