MCH was founded in 1928 by noted educator Dr. Forrest E. Long. Dr. Long was a Professor of Education at New York University. He was also an author, editor, publisher, administrator, and innovator. While at NYU, he became the editor and publisher of The Clearing House, an educational journal for secondary schools. The focus of the journal was to be a "clearing house" of ideas and research about the new "junior high school" as grades 6, 7, 8, 9 were known at that time. Dr. Long also started an annual conference of principals to exchange and debate educational practices of junior high schools. His conference, now known as The Long Conference, continues to this day, still sponsored each year in Dr. Long's memory by the National Association of Secondary School Principals.

Distribution of The Clearing House to secondary school principals soon evolved into the first commercial school mailing list and became the forerunner of today's educational mailing list industry. Before the age of computers the mailing lists were maintained mechanically on addressograph plates. Soon the New York City office in Rockefeller Center became too small, and a branch office was opened in Sweet Springs, Missouri, Dr. Long's birthplace.

In addition to being a journal publisher and mailing list and mailing services supplier, the company was also a book publisher under the name Roxbury Press. In the 1930s the company's Inor Guidance Series by Richard D. Allen became the national best seller in books for high school guidance counselors. The company pioneered when it published Sex Education as Human Relations by Lester Kirkendahl, what has since been recognized as the first book that dared to consider sex education as a topic of possible interest to schools.

Among many other educational publications was another of a pioneering nature, Social Studies Skills, organized with an individual self-testing key enabling students to progress at their own rates. This supplementary junior high school social studies book was written by Dr. Long and his wife Dr. Helen Halter, also an educator. First published in 1942, it became a best seller and went through eight editions.

In 1962 the Longs retired and moved the entire company to Sweet Springs. MCH experienced a period of great growth. Dr. Long's national contacts had expanded his interests beyond school-based education. In 1942 he had been appointed by the Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Morgenthau, Jr., as Chairman of a National Tax Commission. In 1944 his work in safety education was recognized when President Franklin Roosevelt arranged for him to have a two-year leave of absence from New York University to serve as Manager of the National Safety Council in Chicago. This assignment included negotiations with John L. Lewis and other labor leaders as well as national radio speeches and participation in events across the nation. In 1945 and 1946 President Truman appointed Dr. Long to the President's Highway Safety Conference in Washington, D.C.

Dr. Long's wide interests were reflected in the operations of MCH. Mailing lists were extended to encompass governmental institutions, libraries, hospitals, and religious institutions, among others. The book business was expanded to include "Books of the World" which imported books from foreign countries to be used in foreign language classes in American high schools.

In 1968 a new 26,000 square foot building was built and the mail shop was expanded. By the mid-70s, the mailing lists and direct marketing services were growing at such a rate that they demanded full attention for continued expansion. Mailing lists and services became the exclusive effort of the company in the 1990s when Dr. Edwin Tutt Long, a cardiovascular surgeon, and his wife, Mary M. Long, an administrative head nurse in cardiac specialized nursing services, agreed to take early retirement to head the company. The second generation of Longs brought a lifetime of experience and expertise in the healthcare industry. Their interest and knowledge has been the key to an expansion of the company's healthcare related databases.

In 1993 Peter E. Long, grandson of the founder, joined the company after eight years with Coopers and Lybrand, the international accounting and consulting firm. He left his position as a senior manager in the company's Information Systems Consultant Group where he had worked with major corporate and institutional clients in the U.S. and abroad. John F. Hood joined the management team in 1997. His experience includes eighteen years in the educational mailing list industry, including nine years at Market Data Retrieval where he was General Manager and seven years at CMG where he was Senior Vice President responsible for their educational mailing lists.

The decade of the 1990s was another period of renewal and growth for the company. The Sweet Springs facility was remodeled twice, essentially having been converted from a publisher's warehouse into an office building. The telephone research staff now makes thousands of calls a day to update the database. Additional direct marketing products and services were added and a new Oracle database computer system was implemented.

The company's 90+ employees include a core group whose experience, knowledge, and dedication represent the heritage of Dr. Forrest Long and the spirit of MCH. Five of them joined the company in the 1960s. The company currently offers comprehensive business-to-institution (B2i) databases and mailing lists. The MCH database features information on 1.3 million institutions and 8.2 million decision makers. The largest institutional markets include governments, hospitals, medical practices, schools, school districts, and churches. The research department conducts custom telephone research for MCH customers. In addition, the company offers mailing list brokerage and data processing services (merge/purge, file cleaning, postal presort, etc.).

The MCH GeoPoints division provides accurate physical address data (known as places2protect™), detailed attributes, and asset information. The database is the first comprehensive, national database on critical facilities. It is a continuous, cost-effective, and sustainable GIS resource for institutional information. The points of interest data is included in the federal Homeland Security Infrastructure Protection Database for use in emergency preparation and response.

Dr. Forrest E. Long's vision of a company serving institutions (B2i) was a wise one. Each represents a major and growing share of the U.S. economy. MCH can continue to experience growth indefinitely while remaining committed to its core institutional markets. The company believes in a long-term approach with its customers as well with its employees. MCH believes that if it serves its customers well, their businesses will grow. The company's business will grow as a result of their growth. That is the essence of MCH's plan for the future.