Alfred C. Bancroft Jr., better known as Monk, died on December 10, 2017, after a courageous battle with brain cancer. He was the first son of Alfred C. Bancroft Sr. and Frances Horton Bancroft of Essex Fells, NJ. Monk was a resident of Fayston, VT, since 1998 with a second residence in West Lebanon, NH. He was born November 19, 1935, and lived over 50 years in Essex Fells, NJ, before retiring to Vermont. He is survived by his wife, Jane Noyes Bancroft; brother, Thomas Bancroft and sister-in-law Rosemarie Bancroft of Andover, NJ; three children, Elizabeth D. Bancroft of Orange, VT, Dr. Catherine Betts and her husband John Betts of Morriston, FL, and Alfred Coe Bancroft III and his wife Tracy Bancroft of Glastonbury, CT; as well as three grandchildren, Dale Bancroft, Melissa Bancroft and Brady Bancroft.
Monk was a graduate of Kimball Union Academy in 1953 and Dartmouth College in 1957, where he was a member of the ski team, the track team, and Alpha Delta Phi fraternity. After serving his military obligation in Japan, he was discharged as a captain in the Air Force. Monk’s career was in insurance and he retired in 1998 as the president of David MacGregor Company in Nutley, NJ. He coached for 10 years with the Essex Fells Bengals and Roseland Raiders of the West Essex Junior Football League. He was a member of the Essex Fells Country Club, the Montclair Ski Club, the Charter Club of Patterson, the Mad River Valley Rotary Club and the Mad River Tennis Club.
Monk’s passion was skiing. He competed in both Nordic and alpine skiing events at Kimball Union Academy and Dartmouth. In 1957, he placed second in the Dartmouth-Harvard slalom at Tuckerman Ravine on Mount Washington. In the 1960s Monk was NJ state champion in slalom, giant slalom and downhill. Monk continued competing when he moved to Vermont. He raced for his Rotary Club team and in many races at Mad River Glen, including leading his family to victory twice in the annual Mad River Glen Family Race. He joined the Mad River Glen ski patrol in 1968 and remained active until a week before his diagnosis last January. The Mad River Glen ski patrol was an integral part of his life.
Through much of his life, Monk was also an active golfer, tennis player, sailor, hiker, bicycle rider, builder of stone walls and a renowned reciter and writer of limericks.
A celebration of Monk’s life will be held at the Mad River Glen Basebox at a later date. Memorial gifts can be made in Monk’s honor to either the Mad River Glen ski patrol, P.O. Box 1089, Waitsfield, VT 05673, or the Dartmouth College Class of 1957 Scholarship Fund c/o Gift Recording, 6066 Development Office, Hanover, NH 03755. Assisting the family is Perkins-Parker Funeral Home and Cremation Service in Waterbury, VT. To send online condolences visit www.perkinsparker.com.
