Elsie Singmaster

Singmaster was born on August 29, 1879, in Schuylkill Haven, Pennsylvania, to parents of German ancestry.

Her first published short story was The Lèse-Majesté of Hans Heckendorn, in the November 1905 issue of Scribner's Magazine.

Her 1924 short story The Courier of the Czar earned a position of merit in the 1924 O. Henry Award[2] and, perhaps her most famous title, Swords of Steel, received a Newbery Honor in 1934.

Her final work was "It Was Once a Jail", published in The Philadelphia Inquirer in January 1950.

[3] Gettysburg College's Musselman Library digitized The Hidden Road in 2019 when the 1923 text entered the public domain.