Macmillan Inc. is a defunct
American
American(s) may refer to:
* American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America"
** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America
** American ancestry, pe ...
book
publishing company
Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, news ...
. Originally established as the American division of the
British Macmillan Publishers
Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publi ...
, the two were later separated and acquired by other companies, with the remnants of the original American division of Macmillan present in
McGraw-Hill Education's Macmillan/McGraw-Hill textbooks,
Gale's Macmillan Reference USA division, and some trade imprints of
Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publi ...
that were transferred when both companies were owned by
Paramount Communications. The German publisher
Holtzbrinck, which bought the British Macmillan in 1999, purchased US rights to the Macmillan name in 2001 and rebranded its American division with it in 2007.
History
Brett family
George Edward Brett opened the first Macmillan office in the United States in 1869 and Macmillan sold its U.S. operations to the Brett family,
George Platt Brett Sr. and
George Platt Brett Jr. in 1896, resulting in the creation of an American company, Macmillan Publishing. Even with the split of the American company from its parent company in Britain, George Brett Jr. and Harold Macmillan remained close personal friends.
[Macmillan]
from Answers.com
George P. Brett Jr. made the following comments in a letter dated 23 January 1947 to Daniel Macmillan about his family's devotion to the American publishing industry:
For the record my grandfather was employed by Macmillan's of England as a salesman. He came to the United States with his family in the service of Macmillan's of England and built up a business of approximately $50,000 before he died. He was succeeded . . . by my father, who eventually incorporated The Macmillan Company of New York and built up business of about $9,000,000. I succeeded my father, and we currently doing a business of approximately $12,000,000. So then, the name of Brett and the name of Macmillan have been and are synonymous in the United States.
Under the leadership of the Brett family, MacMillan served as the publisher of American authors, Winston Churchill,
Margaret Mitchell
Margaret Munnerlyn Mitchell (November 8, 1900 – August 16, 1949) was an American novelist and journalist. Mitchell wrote only one novel, published during her lifetime, the American Civil War-era novel '' Gone with the Wind'', for which she wo ...
, who wrote ''
Gone with the Wind'', and
Jack London
John Griffith Chaney (January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors to ...
, author of ''
White Fang'' and ''
Call of the Wild''.
The Bretts remained in control of the American offices of Macmillan from its creation in 1869 to the early 1960s, "a span matched by few other families in the history of United States business."
Velikovsky's ''Worlds in Collision''
In spite of strong protest of leading astronomers of the time, MacMillan published in 1950
Imanuel Velikovsky's ''
Worlds in Collision
''Worlds in Collision'' is a book by Immanuel Velikovsky published in 1950. The book postulates that around the 15th century BC, the planet Venus was ejected from Jupiter as a comet or comet-like object and passed near Earth (an actual colli ...
''. When MacMillan was threatened by a boycott it transferred the book to
Doubleday
Mergers and end
Macmillan merged with
Crowell Collier Publishing Company in 1961. The US publisher became a media giant in its own right and renamed itself Macmillan, Inc. in 1973.
In 1979,
Thomas Mellon Evans bought a large stake in Macmillan. Macmillan then was bid on by
Mattel
Mattel, Inc. ( ) is an American multinational toy manufacturing and entertainment company founded in January 1945 and headquartered in El Segundo, California. The company has presence in 35 countries and territories and sells products in mor ...
and
ABC, only for an acquisition by ABC to break down. Macmillan then sold several non-publishing divisions. In 1980, Macmillan sold musical instrument maker
C.G. Conn
C. G. Conn Ltd., sometimes called Conn Instruments or commonly just Conn, is a former American manufacturer of musical instruments incorporated in 1915. It bought the production facilities owned by Charles Gerard Conn, a major figure in earl ...
. In 1981, Macmillan sold
Hagstrom Map, the bookstore
Brentano's and the printer Alco‐Gravure.
[Alternate Link]
via ProQuest
ProQuest LLC is an Ann Arbor, Michigan-based global information-content and technology company, founded in 1938 as University Microfilms by Eugene B. Power. ProQuest is known for its applications and information services for libraries, provid ...
.
In 1981, Macmillan acquired the children's publisher Bradbury Press. In 1982, Macmillan sold its British division,
Cassell
Cassell may refer to:
Companies
* ''Cassell Military Paperbacks'', an imprint of Orion Publishing Group
* ''Cassell's National Library''
* Cassell (publisher) (Cassell Illustrated or Cassell & Co.), a British book publisher now owned by the Orion ...
, to
CBS. In 1984, Macmillan acquired the
Scribner Book Companies and the textbook publishers Sieber & McIntyre, Dellen Publishing, and Pennwell Books. The following year, Macmillan acquired the publishing operations of
ITT
ITT may refer to:
Communication
* Infantry-Tank Telephone, a device allowing infantrymen to speak to the occupants of armoured vehicles.
Mathematics
*Intuitionistic type theory, other name of Martin-Löf Type Theory
*Intensional type theory
B ...
(
Sams,
Bobbs-Merrill, legal publisher Michie Co., trade magazine company Intertec,
Marquis Who's Who
Marquis Who's Who ( or ) is an American publisher of a number of directories containing short biographies. The books usually are entitled ''Who's Who in...'' followed by some subject, such as ''Who's Who in America'', ''Who's Who of American Wome ...
, and
G. K. Hall & Co.). Bobbs-Merrill was subsequently closed, with its remaining books moved to Macmillan. In 1986, Macmillan sold the music publisher
G. Schirmer, Inc.
G. Schirmer, Inc. is an American classical music publishing company based in New York City, founded in 1861. The oldest active music publisher in the United States, Schirmer publishes sheet music for sale and rental, and represents some well-know ...
to
Music Sales Group. In 1987, Macmillan acquired the educational publisher Laidlaw from
Doubleday. In 1988, Macmillan acquired the educational publisher Jossey-Bass.
The company was acquired by the controversial British tycoon
Robert Maxwell
Ian Robert Maxwell (born Ján Ludvík Hyman Binyamin Hoch; 10 June 1923 – 5 November 1991) was a Czechoslovak-born British media proprietor, Parliament of the United Kingdom, member of parliament (MP), suspected spy, and fraudster.
Early i ...
's
Maxwell Communication Corporation in 1989. Later in 1989, Macmillan acquired
Prentice Hall Information from
Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publi ...
and sold Intertec, Macmillan Book Clubs, and Gryphon Editions to
K-III Communications. Maxwell Macmillan Professional and Business Reference Publishing (the former Prentice Hall division) was sold to
Thomson Professional Publishing. Macmillan's directories (led by
Marquis Who's Who
Marquis Who's Who ( or ) is an American publisher of a number of directories containing short biographies. The books usually are entitled ''Who's Who in...'' followed by some subject, such as ''Who's Who in America'', ''Who's Who of American Wome ...
and National Register Publishing) were sold to
Reed Publishing. Michie was sold to
Mead. Macmillan also sold the department store
Gump's, the trade school
Katharine Gibbs, and part of its stake in language school
Berlitz.
Maxwell died in 1991, and Macmillan began selling properties and eventually filed for bankruptcy. Paramount acquired Macmillan Computer Publishing (Sams). Standard Rate & Data Service was sold to
OAG, a sister Maxwell company. ''
Collier's Encyclopedia
''Collier's Encyclopedia'' is a discontinued general encyclopedia first published in 1949 by P. F. Collier and Son in the United States. With ''Encyclopedia Americana'' and ''Encyclopædia Britannica, Collier's Encyclopedia'' became one of the th ...
'' was sold to
Planeta and
DeAgostini
De Agostini S.p.A. is an Italian holding company that coordinates the strategic operating companies De Agostini Editore, De Agostini Communications, IGT, and DeA Capital, and makes financial investments, among which the main investment is a ...
. Macmillan Inc. was eventually sold to
Simon & Schuster
Simon & Schuster () is an American publishing company and a subsidiary of Paramount Global. It was founded in New York City on January 2, 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. As of 2016, Simon & Schuster was the third largest publi ...
/
Paramount Communications for $552.8 million and finalized in February 1994. (At the time,
Viacom had just purchased S&S via the acquisition of its former parent company
Paramount Communications; it is now owned by
CBS Corporation
The second incarnation of CBS Corporation (the first being a short-lived rename of the Westinghouse Electric Corporation) was an American multinational media conglomerate with interests primarily in commercial broadcasting, publishing, an ...
.) The Macmillan and Atheneum adult trade publications were merged into Scribner. Macmillan Publishing USA became the name of Simon & Schuster's reference division.
Pearson acquired the Macmillan name in America in 1998 (and merged Macmillan Computer Publishing with Addison Wesley Longman to form Pearson Tech Group division of Pearson Education), following its purchase of the Simon & Schuster educational and professional group (which included various Macmillan properties).
Pearson sold the children's reference imprints of Macmillan Library Reference in preparation for a sale. Pearson sold the Macmillan Reference USA division (which included
Scribner Reference and G. K. Hall) to
Thomson Gale in 1999.
Macmillan's school publishing operations were merged into a joint operation with
McGraw-Hill
McGraw Hill is an American educational publishing company and one of the "big three" educational publishers that publishes educational content, software, and services for pre-K through postgraduate education. The company also publishes refere ...
in 1989. McGraw-Hill acquired full ownership of Macmillan/McGraw-Hill in 1993 after Maxwell's death.
Holtzbrinck
Holtzbrinck purchased most of the rights to the Macmillan name from Pearson in 2001,
but not any of the businesses then associated with it. Holtzbrinck rebranded its US division with the name in 2007.
The online user-maintained database Jacketflap reports these constituent American publishers of Holtzbrinck's Macmillan division (August 2010):
"Publisher information: MacMillan"
JacketFlap. August 15, 2010. Retrieved 2012-08-30.
: Farrar Straus and Giroux, Henry Holt & Company, W.H. Freeman
W. H. Freeman and Company is an imprint of Macmillan Higher Education, a division of Macmillan Publishers. Macmillan publishes monographs and textbooks for the sciences under the imprint.
History
The company was founded in 1946 by William H. F ...
and Worth Publishers, Palgrave Macmillan
Palgrave Macmillan is a British academic and trade publishing company headquartered in the London Borough of Camden. Its programme includes textbooks, journals, monographs, professional and reference works in print and online. It maintains off ...
, Bedford/St. Martin's, Picador, Roaring Brook Press, St. Martin’s Press, Tor Books
Tor Books is the primary imprint of Tor Publishing Group (previously Tom Doherty Associates), a publishing company based in New York City. It primarily publishes science fiction and fantasy titles, and is the largest publisher of Chinese scienc ...
, and Bedford Freeman & Worth Publishing Group.
Authors
Publishers
* George Edward Brett
* George Platt Brett Sr.
*George Platt Brett Jr.
George Platt Brett Jr. (December 9, 1893 – February 11, 1984) served at Chairman of the American division of Macmillan Publishing and secured publishing rights to ''Gone With the Wind''.
Biography
Career
George Brett started with Macmillan i ...
See also
* Richard M. Brett
Richard M. Brett (September 3, 1903 – September 7, 1989) was an American conservationist and author.
Biography
Early life
Brett was born in Darien, Connecticut and spent most of his life in Woodstock, Vermont, and Fairfield, Connecticut. Br ...
* Macmillan Publishers
Macmillan Publishers (occasionally known as the Macmillan Group; formally Macmillan Publishers Ltd and Macmillan Publishing Group, LLC) is a British publishing company traditionally considered to be one of the 'Big Five' English language publi ...
References
Further reading
* James, Elizabeth (2002) ''Macmillan: a Publishing Tradition''. Basingstoke: Palgrave
{{Authority control
Defunct book publishing companies of the United States
Publishing companies established in 1896
1869 establishments in New York (state)
Publishing companies established in 1869
Former Viacom subsidiaries
American companies established in 1869