Gwen Bancroft passed away at age 98 on Monday (October 8, 2012). Born soon after her parents Monica and George Price moved to West Hartford, she grew up with her younger brother G. Gordon who was always called "Bud" after she knick-named him her "baby buddy." It was a time of dairy farms and fruit orchards in the Elmwood neighborhood of her childhood and she was active in the community church. When her father died suddenly during the Great Depression, she had to go to work to help support the family but was also determined to stay in high school and graduated. She married and had children while the family continued to live in her mother's home on Newington Road. After her husband left the family, she always worked hard to provide a good home. She was a secretary for the West Hartford public school system, worked at Pratt & Whitney and the Abbott Ball Company, and then had a long career before retiring from Connecticut General Life Insurance Company. Her family was so grateful that she had a second chance at a fuller life when she renewed an old friendship and then married Ted Bancroft of South Windsor. Like her mother, she loved to garden, cook desserts and now had a home of her own to welcome her extended family. She learned to drive, went back to work part-time for a while and had the opportunity to travel extensively throughout the United States and Canada as well realizing her dream to travel abroad. After the death of her husband, she moved back to West Hartford, lived happily at The Chatfield and then the Hebrew Home and Hospital, where she had wonderful caregivers for several years, including her final weeks in hospice. She is survived by her daughter Joan Lunden and her husband Bob of West Hartford; her son David Sullivan and his partner Betsy Vogt of Bloomfield; and her son Kevin Sullivan and his wife Carolyn Thornberry of West Hartford. She was proud of her children and their spouses, including Elaine Sullivan who predeceased her. She deeply loved her grandchildren Patricia King and her husband David, David Lunden and his wife Mary, and Robert Toce and his wife Lisa. She always took great joy in her great-grandchildren Megan King, Jennifer King, Grace Lunden, Maeve Lunden and Payson Lunden.
Funeral services and burial will be private but family and friends may share in her appreciation by contributing to the Hebrew Home and Hospital at 1 Abrahms Boulevard, West Hartford, CT 06117 or the Town that Cares Fund, Town of West Hartford, 50 South Main Street, West Hartford, CT 06107. Funeral arrangements are provided by Sheehan-Hilborn-Breen Funeral Home in West Hartford.