Ellen November Rigby

The 11-year-old Ellen Rigby put the world on notice that she would not stand by and let injustices get in her way. When the Little League baseball officials of Great Neck, New York, said she could not play because she was a girl, she launched a campaign to change the rules. She prevailed, and girls won the opportunity to play. Years later, at age 37, facing a devastating diagnosis of stage 4 (metastatic) breast cancer, Ellen refused to let this—her first occurrence of disease—define or dominate her life. Instead, breast cancer spotlighted a young woman who effortlessly set an unattainable standard for how to live graciously and courageously despite overwhelming odds. To highlight just how possible it was to live life fully, Ellen appeared on NBC's “Today Show” and the “ABC Evening News” and proved that a brutal disease need not overshadow life. She inspired many women beyond words to discover hope when they were overwhelmed and profoundly shocked as they envisioned the end of their young lives.

The quiet, unassuming, thoughtful, and ever cheerful woman found strength and meaning in her life by putting others' needs ahead of her own, no matter how lousy she may have been feeling. After her diagnosis, Ellen volunteered for Y-ME and the Young Survival Coalition to mentor and guide other young women through the trauma and decision making of breast cancer. She connected with many through her endless work at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center to soothe, educate, and support young women newly diagnosed with cancer. Ellen's relationship with the women in her metastatic breast cancer support group at MSK showed her unique empathy and compassion for others. During her 12-year journey, Ellen always found time to visit a colleague in need of support or just keep someone company, no matter how busy she was at work or how poorly she felt herself because of the latest treatment. These women were as close and dear to Ellen as any sister could ever have been, even as short as many of those relationships inevitably were.

Metastatic breast cancer and its relentless assault on her body never overcame Ellen's indomitable spirit and love of life. Ellen’s outlook on life, even before her diagnosis, was "If not today, when? Tomorrow may not come." After completing the New York Bar Exam, Ellen pursued a dream through a six-week Outward Bound course to become a rock climber. Soon after being diagnosed with cancer, Ellen took up rowing the single scull, insisting that her husband, Peter, buy her a shell for herself. She later persuaded Peter to take up golf together, playing 50 rounds their first season. A highlight about which any golfer would brag was her pitch shot on the first hole at Pebble Beach that holed in from 20 yards out. She enjoyed New York's ballet with a close group of colleagues. But Ellen was especially proud of the timber frame weekend getaway home in the Pennsylvania woods that she and Peter designed and built; it was a comforting, Zen-like escape from the endless stream of doctor’s appointments, treatments, and ravages inflicted by cancer's unyielding attack on her. Beckett, the couple’s gregarious and energetic Llewellin Setter, was Ellen's loyal and loving companion for years, especially during long walks in Manhattan's Riverside Park and around the weekend home. 

Ellen Rigby died on February 3, 2013, three days before her 50th birthday. She grew up in Great Neck, NY. After graduating from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania, Ellen earned a law degree at the University of Michigan. After first working at the Rogers & Wells law firm and Merrill Lynch's real estate investment trust, Ellen served as General Counsel until her death at the Emmes Asset Management Co., a private commercial real estate firm.

Donations in to the "Ellen N. Rigby Fund for Metastatic Breast Cancer Research" at MSK go to a fund to support young research fellows at MSK. Led by Dr. Sarat Chandarlapaty, this team is investigating why breast cancers that rely on HER2 to signal growth become resistant to the drugs that target this receptor. To gain deeper insights into mechanisms of resistance to anti-HER2 drugs, these investigators get tumor biopsies from patients before and again after treatment with standard and experimental drugs. They then use the latest technology to fully interrogate these tissues at the molecular level to find subtle but important functional changes that may explain their ability to re-grow after treatment. Their work is informing the development of novel strategies and newer drugs for patients with this disease and is serving as a model for other studies of drug resistance. With your support, this program will continue to expand so that the pace of progress can accelerate.