Betty Smith's A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1943), a story about growing up poor in turn-of-the-century Brooklyn, was originally an entry for a Harper & Brothers memoir contest. More
By 1844, Thomas Nelson’s company had grown large enough to open an office in London, under the leadership of Thomas Nelson Jr. and William Nelson. More
Shortly after the Montgomery bus boycott of 1955 and ‘56, Harper & Brothers religious books editor Eugene Exman left New York City for Alabama and secured a meeting with Martin Luther King Jr. More
When J. B. Lippincott (later acquired by HarperCollins) editor Therese (Tay) von Hohoff saw the first draft of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird (1960), she saw a promising story, but one in need of some reshaping and editing. More
HarperCollins Publishers began as J. & J. Harper, a small family printing shop run by brothers James and John Harper in New York City in March 1817. More
This letter from E. B. White’s wife, Katharine White, to Ursula Nordstrom, head of the U.S. Harper Children’s division, expresses her husband’s excitement... More
One summer day in 1884, Horatio Harper, grandson of founder John Harper, began talking with a bright young boy during his regular steamboat commute from Long Island to Manhattan. More
Illustrator Syd Hoff sent these sketches to Ursula Nordstrom, head of the U.S. Harper Children’s division, as suggestions for the now-classic Danny and the Dinosaur.More
In 1860, Harper & Brothers had paid Wilkie Collins £750 for The Woman in White, which heralded the publisher’s entry into the crime and mystery genre. More
The publishing house of Zondervan was launched during the Great Depression (1931) by brothers Pat and Bernie Zondervan in the spare bedroom of a Michigan farmhouse. More
Sir Stanley Unwin, chairman of British publishers George Allen & Unwin (later acquired by HarperCollins), originally rejected the 9,250-page manuscript of The Lord of the Rings, the sequel to J. R. R. Tolkien’s moderately successful (at the time) The Hobbit, as it was too long, and the author would make a deal with the publisher only if they also agreed to take another of his unfinished books. More