E.P Dutton and Co. (New York)

RA Collection: People and Organisations

Edward Payson 'E.P.' Dutton (1831-1923) was an American book publisher. Born in Keene, New Hampshire, Dutton was the son of George Damon Dutton and Mary Dutton. In 1852, Dutton founded the E.P. Dutton bookselling company in Boston, Massachusetts. The business sold fiction and non-fiction, and within a short time expanded into the selling of children's literature.

In 1864, he opened a branch office to sell books in New York City and in 1869 moved his company's headquarters there and entered the book publishing business.

From 1888 onward, he started working with Ernest Nister (1841-1906).

In 1906, Dutton struck a deal with the English publishing company of J. M. Dent to be the American distributor of the Everyman's Library series of classic literature reprints.

It published children's books under the Unicorn imprint, with some books published in the 1990s. Dutton Children's Books continues today.

In 1975, Dutton was acquired by the Dutch publisher Elsevier, who sold the company to the buyout firm Dyson-Kissner-Moran in 1981. The paperback publisher New American Library acquired Dutton in 1985. New American Library was acquired by Penguin Group in 1986, and split into two imprints: Dutton and Dutton Children's Books. Dutton is now a boutique imprint within Penguin Group.Penguin merged with Random House to form Penguin Random House in 2013.