diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index c2f7d0c73..14bd94a8d 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -20,7 +20,12 @@ See [install.txt](https://github.com/behdad/fonttools/blob/master/Doc/install.tx
 
 See [documentation.html](https://github.com/behdad/fonttools/blob/master/Doc/documentation.html) in the "Doc" subdirectory for TTX usage instructions and information about the TTX file format.
 
+#### History
+
+The fontTools project was started by Just van Rossum in 1999, and was maintained as an open source project at <http://sourceforge.net/projects/fonttools/>. In 2008, Paul Wise (pabs3) began helping Just with stability maintenance. In 2013 Behdad Esfahbod began a friendly fork, thoroughly reviewing the codebase and making changes at <https://github.com/behdad/fonttools> to add new features and support for new font formats. 
+
 ### Community
+
 * https://groups.google.com/d/forum/fonttools
 
 ### License