The name Mother Goose originated in a French poem published in 1650, La Muze historique. Her first association with literature for children occurred in 1697, when Charles Perrault incorporated her into the frontispiece for his collection, Histoires, ou Contes du temps pass, a book intended for adults. The title translated into English in 1729, marked the entrance of Mother Goose into English. Despite some claims that Mother Goose first appeared in a compilation of nursery rhymes in a 1719 American Edition, copies of this edition were never found. Thus, Mother Goose was initially associated with a compilation of nursery rhymes in 1780, in London, and Mother Goose's first appearance in American literature occurred with Isaiah Thomas's reprint of this title in 1786. By nineteenth century America, Mother Goose had become a symbol of childhood.

The printing history of Mother Goose is a story with three major aspects. Following the eighteenth century example of the Worcester publisher and historian, Isaiah Thomas, the Boston publishing firm of Munroe & Francis manufactured editions of Mother Goose's nursery rhymes from ca. 1822 until the mid-1840's. The popularity of their volumes helped to make Mother Goose the American emblem of childhood.

The next major publisher of Mother Goose was the McLoughlin Brothers, the most prolific publisher of picture books in nineteenth century America. They issued a large number of editions that relied on colorful, cheaply made, woodcut illustrations, the gaudiness of which contrasted sharply with the gloominess of art and architecture during this period (1865-1900).

Finally, the iconographic context for Mother Goose included a rich variety of images associating women with birds, and winged goddesses, including images from Greek and Egyptian mythology, and going back into the Neolithic and Upper Paleolithic era, as far back as 25,000 BC.