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Dr. Fisher was a senior program officer with the Gates Family Foundation and the Director of the Molly Brown House Museum in Denver. She served on the board of the Colorado State Historical Society (now History Colorado) for 28 years and on the Advisory Board of the National Trust for Historic Preservation for nine years. Historic Denver gave her the Molly Brown Spirit Award for community service. Similarly, the University of Colorado at Denver gave her the Alumni Recognition Award for her role in developing the public history (applied history) program at CU Denver.
Her publications include Junior League: Leaders in Community Service 1918-1993, “Power’s Dynamo Unloosed: Henry L. Doherty and the Denver Gas and Electric Company,” and One Hundred Years of Energy, Public Service Company of Colorado. Hill’s Gold, her first novel, was awarded first place in historical fiction by the Colorado Independent Publishers Association and was a finalist in the Colorado Authors League awards. The Price of a Contract is the second historical fiction in a series about business entrepreneurs in the American West and won a CIPA bronze award.
The Ring of a Bell, a novel about the early development of the telephone, will be published in 2024.
The author has spent most of her life in Colorado enjoying the outdoors, including climbing all of Colorado’s fourteeners, Mt. Rainier, and Kilimanjaro. She and her husband have three grown children and four grandsons.
Reviewed by Heather Osborne for Readers' Favorite
The Price of a Contract by Ellen Kingman Fisher is an epic historical fiction novel, taking the reader on a magnificent journey from the East to the West Coast during the late 1800s. Kate Sinclair is not the type of woman who wants to marry and settle down. Instead, she’d rather explore the great United States, opened up to so many by the Transcontinental Railroad. She bravely journeys to San Francisco, meeting Frank Ellsworth, who is about to start a job with Western Union, a telegraph company. He suggests that Kate might enjoy the challenge of working as a telegraph operator, and with that, Kate sets out to learn the trade. However, her work is not with its obstacles, namely that she’s a woman. Still, she manages to surpass the odds and become a traveling telegrapher, journeying to offices all across the states to help them work more efficiently. In the process, she and Frank begin to form a deeper relationship. Yet, when he suggests something more, Kate is reluctant to commit for reasons she cannot grasp. Will she be able to confide in Frank the true reason for her hesitancy, or is he going to end up lost to her forever?
A fantastic example of American historical fiction set at the turn of the century, The Price of a Contract by Ellen Kingman Fisher was a well-researched and engaging read. Kate’s character was admirable in how she fought to be respected as a working woman in a time when women had very few rights. Her bravery and fortitude in forging her path were inspiring. I liked how she took her time to really get to know Frank over the years, and how he respected her and her ideas. Fisher wove together a beautiful story and kept me hooked from the first page. It was amazing to read about early San Francisco as well, as it’s where I was born and raised. I highly recommend this novel for anyone interested in turn-of-the-century historical fiction set in the United States, and for anyone interested in how the telegraph and railroads shaped the growing country.
