Salem is a city in Henry County, Iowa, United States.

[3] Salem was settled originally by Quakers with the intent that it be a community of Friends.

"[4] Independently another Quaker, Isaac Pigeon, who may have visited the spot before Street, brought his family to the area.

They became the first citizens of Salem, and with Peter Boyer, began to recruit other Quakers to migrate westward to join them.

[5] From the early years members of other Christian denominations settled in Salem, so it was never an exclusively Quaker community.

Being only twenty miles from the Missouri border, Salem became an important depot on the Underground Railroad.

His house on West Main St. is listed on the National Register of Historic Places as an Underground Railroad station.

Agreed in their opposition to slavery, they disagreed on actively helping slaves escape.

In 1847, the Lewelling family traveled by covered wagon along the Oregon Trail along with a special covered wagon that had been designed to transport more than 700 young fruit and nut trees, apples, pears, peaches, cherries, quince, walnut, and hickory.

[6] The surviving trees became the parent stock of all of the early orchards in the Pacific Northwest.

[7] According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 0.61 square miles (1.58 km2), all land.

34.1% of all households were made up of individuals, and 14.2% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older.