Ellen Creagar: Adventurer, empowered by others

Women in History

Crystal R. Albers
Posted 3/30/18

Ellen Creagar went on her very first adventure when she was just two weeks old.

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Ellen Creagar: Adventurer, empowered by others

Women in History

Posted
TORRINGTON – Ellen Creagar went on her very first adventure when she was just two weeks old.
Shortly after her birth in Connecticut, Creagar and her mother boarded a plane to East Africa – specifically Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
“My dad was working on his Ph.D. at Yale and doing his research there,” Creagar explained. The family lived in East Africa for two years, before moving to Flagstaff, Ariz., where Creagar’s father taught at Northern Arizona University.
“I lived there (through) high school,” she said. “My family moved when I was in college to Denver, (Colo.). I had left to the east coast to go to college. I went to Wellesley College in … Massachusetts.”
Creagar graduated with a double major in political science and geology.
“In the mid-1980s, the oil market was really bad, and I decided working in geology was just stupid,” she said, adding she took a year off after college and went back to Flagstaff to work at an athletic club.
Creagar began studying law at the University of Colorado in Boulder in the fall of 1987, and graduated with her degree in 1990.
“Then I worked for a judge in Denver District Court, Justice Nancy Rice, which was just an awesome experience,” Creagar said. Justice Rice is currently Chief Justice of the Colorado Supreme Court. “I feel that my whole life I’ve been empowered by powerful women, so she was really formative.”
Creagar practiced law in Denver at a civil litigation firm until she and her husband, Bob, moved to Torrington in the mid-1990s for Bob’s position as math instructor at Eastern Wyoming College. In 1996, Creagar also secured an instructor role at the college, and continues to teach a wide variety of classes, including American and Wyoming Government, U.S. History, History of the U.S. West, American Indian History, Ethics and Business Law.
In 2010, to round out her personal education, Creagar earned a master’s degree in teaching history from the University of Wyoming.
Creagar and her husband met in Flagstaff at a Denny’s restaurant, where he worked as a short-order cook and she waitressed.
The couple married in 1988 while Creagar attended law school and Bob studied at the Colorado School of Mines to pursue a degree in mathematical engineering.
“When I first started (at EWC), I worked three-quarter time,” Creagar said. “I had my daughter, Molly in 1997, and son, Ethan in 2000. I worked three-quarter time for 10 years while the kids were little. I began teaching full-time in 2006.”
Although Creagar’s background suggests a law-oriented career path, she said she’s extremely content teaching at the college.
“Practicing law was my not my cup of tea – I’m not a conflict person,” Creagar said. “I really like teaching. If you asked me, coming out of college, if I was interested in teaching, I would have said, ‘No way.’ My dad was a political science college professor … (but) things just seem to unroll themselves a certain way – things just seem to have worked out.”
Throughout her life, Creagar said she’s been influenced and inspired by people around her – strong women in particular.
“I attribute my confidence and independence to my mom, who is so strong and courageous,” she said. “She was in the first class at University of Connecticut law school that admitted women; when we lived in Arizona she hiked with my brothers and I in and out of the Grand Canyon a couple of times a year and has traveled to every continent and all over the U.S.
“Definitely Justice Nancy Rice,” Creagar continued. “She is a person who works and lives with intense integrity, and she had a lot of drive to get where she is and she did it without stepping on people. She did it by being the best she could be.”
Creagar said she also feels inspired by her friends, including Nyana Sims.
“She’s probably one the most positive people I know, and she brings out the best in people, which is cool,” she said. “Janan McCreery and Peggy Knittel are also role models for women here, in terms of dealing with students and colleagues always with integrity and professionalism. They still just always have good advice about things.
“Those are some of the people who have come into my life for a reason and at the right time and have made me a better person.
“I think, too, I have a lot of students who are almost role models to me, because they are so determined,” Creagar said. “They have passion … intellectual curiosity … I try to teach with passion and knowledge and show them it’s OK to be passionate and invigorated about things.”
Even after working at the college for 20 years, Creagar said she still finds her work exciting and enjoyable.
“I really can’t imagine doing anything else and loving it every day,” she said. “And I try to model that to my students … I tell them to find something you love, but you have to put yourself in a place where you can seize the opportunity when it comes by.
“I just think I can learn something from everyone I meet and every situation I’m in,” Creagar said. “I try to show up every day and do my best.”