Houghton Mifflin Harcourt traces its origins to 1832 when William Ticknor and John Allen purchased a bookselling business in Boston. The modern entity formed on the 16th of July 2007 after Houghton Mifflin Riverdeep acquired Harcourt's education and trade divisions.
Houghton Mifflin rejected Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking in 1961 before Alfred A. Knopf published it the following year. This decision is now considered one of the most famous blunders in American publishing history because the book sold millions of copies worldwide.
Veritas Capital acquired Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for $21 per share or about $2.8 billion through a tender offer completed on the 6th of April 2022. The company went private after 57% of shares were put up for tender, ending public trading status.
The company was created when Houghton Mifflin Riverdeep signed a definitive agreement to acquire Harcourt's education and trade divisions on the 16th of July 2007. This merger combined operations from Houghton, Mifflin, and Harcourt into a single expanded entity named Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
In 1979 Houghton Mifflin acquired the catalog of Parnassus Press and Clarion Books while also purchasing the educational publishing operations of Rand McNally in 1980. These moves expanded their reach into children's literature and standardized testing alongside existing textbook operations.