list of references but its sources remain unclear because it has insufficient inline citations . please help to improve this article by introducing more precise citations . june 2009 learn how and when to remove this template message thomas nelson parent company harpercollins founded 1798 1854 us founder thomas nelson country of origin scotland uk headquarters location nashville tennessee key people mark schoenwald president & ceo stuart bitting evp & cfo carol nygren evp & managing director live event management inc. tom knight senior vice president sales publication types bibles books curriculum digital content revenue 237.8 million 2005 owner s harpercollins news corp number of employees approximately 450 official website www.thomasnelson.com thomas nelson is a publishing firm that began in west bow edinburgh scotland in 1798 as the namesake of its founder . the original name of the founder was actually neilson but owing to many errors made by his customers he changed it to nelson . it is a subsidiary of harpercollins the publishing unit of news corp. their most successful title to date is heaven is for real which became their first title to sell more than one million ebooks . 1 in canada the nelson imprint is used for educational publishing . in the united kingdom it was a mainstream publisher until the late 20th century and is now part of another educational imprint nelson thornes . contents 1 british history 2 original american history 3 current united states company 4 canadian history 5 see also 6 references 7 bibliography 8 external links british history edit memorial to thomas nelson at st bernard s well edinburgh by john rhind grave of thomas nelson grange cemetery edinburgh thomas nelson sr. founded the company that bears his name in edinburgh in 1798 originally as a second hand bookshop at 2 west bow just off the grassmarket 2 recognizing a ready market for cheap standard editions of non copyright works which he attempted to satisfy by publishing reprints of classics . the company gained its sons when william and thomas jr. entered their father s business in 1835 and 1839 respectively . thomas sr. died in 1861 and is buried in the extreme nw corner of grange cemetery in edinburgh . william concentrated his talents on the marketing side while thomas jr. devoted his to editing and production . the firm went on to become a publisher of new books and as the nineteenth century progressed it produced an increasingly wide range of non religious materials ; by 1881 religion accounted for less than 6 % of the firm s output . their hope park works in edinburgh burned down in 1878 and the city council allowed temporary accommodation on the meadows . in appreciation the company funded the stone pillars at the east end of melville drive . william nelson died in 1887 and thomas jr. died in 1892 . they were succeeded by george brown thomas s nephew who directed the company until thomas iii and ian thomas jr. s sons were able to join him and john buchan as partners . buchan employed by the firm until 1929 dedicated his novel the thirty nine steps to thomas iii thomas arthur nelson in 1914 . 3 ian nelson took over as head of the family firm after thomas nelson iii s death in action in 1917 during the first world war . by the early twentieth century thomas nelson had become a secular concern in the united kingdom . the first world war led to the temporary rundown of nelson through the denial of foreign markets the loss of manpower including the death of thomas iii and the general exigencies of wartime and initiated its long term decline . much of the effort expended during the inter war period represented merely an attempt to reverse that decline particularly in expanding the education list and reducing the dependence on reprints . ian nelson remained head of the firm until his death in 1958 . ian nelson s successor his son ronnie nelson seemed less interested in the successful management of the family firm than previous generations . in 1962 thomas nelson and sons was absorbed into the thomson organisation in an effort to sustain its academic and educational publishing interests on a global scale . the printing division of nelsons was sold to the edinburgh company morrison and gibb in 1968 . until 1968 according to the curators of a senate house library exhibition the company specialised in producing popular literature children s books bibles religious works and educational texts . 4 it was the first publisher for sir arthur conan doyle . thomson owned the company from 1960 until 2000 . that year it was acquired by wolters kluwer who merged nelson with its existing publishing arm stanley thornes to form nelson thornes . original american history edit the american branch of thomas nelson was set up in 1854 in new york and by the 1870s it was one of the city s most important firms . citation needed it held the copyright for the american standard version of the bible from 1901 until 1928 when it transferred the copyright to the international council of religious education . in the 1930s the company made a deal with this council which later became part of the national council of churches to publish the revised standard version . the firm was sold to the thomson organization in 1960 and in 1962 the company failed to meet demand for this bible translation . this in turn led the national council of churches to grant other publishers licenses for the work leading to a dramatic fall in revenue for nelson . current united states company edit in 1950 19 year old sam moore came to columbia south carolina with an intent to pursue medical training . moore began to sell bibles door to door in order to pay his way through college at the university of south carolina and later columbia bible college . the lebanese immigrant had a strong sense of american patriotism and free enterprise and used it to establish the national book company in 1958 . in 1961 he established royal publishers selling stock in the firm a year later with notable shareholders including morrow coffey graham mother of noted evangelist billy graham . moore led royal publishers to success for the next five years more than doubling sales every year and resulting in the thomson organization asking if he would take control of nelson s north american operations . instead moore surprised thomson by offering to purchase nelson . moore took over on march 7 1969 preferring to keep the company s name and logo . in canada the brand continues as thomson nelson an educational imprint . in the 1960s thomas nelson moved its headquarters from new york to camden new jersey . it moved again to nashville tennessee in the 1970s . from 1979 to 1982 nelson developed the new king james bible also known as the revised authorized version and under moore began diversifying the company with a gift division . in 1992 thomas nelson inc. began its modern advancement . nelson purchased the word music and books brand from capital cities abc . in 1997 the company split the two spinning off the record label and printed music division one of the largest church music companies to gaylord entertainment . that led to a lawsuit by gaylord in 2001 over the word name and was settled when nelson renamed their book division the w publishing group . that year also led to a corporate expansion by the purchase of the cool springs and rutledge hill press labels . in 2003 world bible publishers was acquired by nelson and also the fiction label westbow press made its debut all books were later consolidated under the nelson brand and westbow press was resurrected in 2009 to offer self publishing services . also an imprint for internet news source worldnetdaily made its debut that year . the agreement dissolved however after 2004 and the former wnd brand is now under the nelson current brand including its authors . thomas nelson now based in nashville publishes leading christian authors including billy graham max lucado john eldredge john maxwell charles stanley michael a. o donnell ted dekker john townsend and dave stone . thomas nelson inc. in 2000 began marketing the women of faith conference a concept devised by author stephen arterburn in 1995 after attending a church conference in atlanta . as of 2013 the women of faith conference is one of the best known women s events around north america attracting more than 400 000 women annually . in 2005 thomas nelson launched the revolve teen conferences built on the women of faith model . michael s. hyatt a 25 year veteran of the publishing industry became president and ceo of the company on august 18 2005 succeeding sam moore who served as the company s ceo for nearly 47 years . in february 2006 it was announced that private equity firm intermedia partners in conjunction with some other investors had agreed to buy thomas nelson for 473 million . the transaction closed on june 12 2006 . the company operated as a private company . in 2010 a group led by kohlberg & company bought a majority share of the company . in 2011 news corporation 5 subsidiary harpercollins 6 announced they had acquired thomas nelson . the acquisition closed in july 2012 . 7 canadian history edit when thomson sold thomas nelson uk it kept the canadian operations of the publisher as part of the company s education division . thomson education was spun off as cengage learning in the united states and canada in 2007 . the nelson name lives on through the canadian company nelson education ltd. an educational publisher . in 2015 nelson education was handed over to debtholders which included ares management citigroup mudrick capital management and sound point capital management . 8 see also edit the lost squire of inglewood zondervan references edit heaven is for real best seller reaches one million ebooks sold . newsblaze.com press release . thomas nelson inc. april 2 2012 . retrieved august 11 2012 . http digital.nls.uk directories browse pageturner.cfm id 83401299 & mode transcription john buchan and his world . pp. 51 52 . exhibitions thomas nelson and sons spreading the word 10 july 6 september 2002 senate house library university of london geert de lombaerde thomas nelson s price tag on nashvillepost.com november 7 2011 1 harpercollins to acquire thomas nelson . publishers weekly . october 31 2011 . retrieved august 11 2012 . news briefs week of july 16 2012 . publishersweekly.com . retrieved august 11 2012 . canada lenders to soon take control of pe backed nelson education . retrieved 2016 01 25 . bibliography edit cumberland snaps up conservative leaning series from nelson in the tennessean 2004 10 19 private equity firm buying thomas nelson in nashville business journal 2006 02 21 dempster john a. h. thomas nelson and sons in the late nineteenth century a study in motivation part one in publishing history 13 1983 pp. 41 87 ; part two in publishing history 14 1983 pp. 5 63 . moore sam american by choice the remarkable fulfilment of an immigrant s dreams nashville nelson 1998 . tebbel john a history of book publishing in the united states new york and london bowker four volumes 1972 1981 . external links edit www.thomasnelson.com thomas nelson usa www.westbowpress.com westbow press self publishing services www.nelson.com nelson education canada www.sapphire.ac.uk v t e harpercollins united states avon caedmon ecco harper harper perennial i can read william morrow and company newmarket press united kingdom william collins sons collins bartholomew the friday project leckie & leckie australia angus & robertson christian biblegateway.com thomas nelson women of faith zondervan canada harlequin enterprises retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title thomas nelson publisher & oldid 736490605