Biographies For Muscatine County Iowa 1889

Source: Portrait and Biographical Album, Muscatine County, Iowa, 1889, page 518
CHARLES A. BANCROFT, editor and publisher of the West Liberty Enterprise, is a native of Hennepin County, Minn., born in 1859, and is a son of Daniel W. Bancroft. His father was a native of Montpelier, Vt., and was reared on a farm. When a young man he went to Medina County, Ohio, where he married and soon afterward removed to Hennepin County, Minn., being among the earliest settlers of that community. They located about eight miles north of Minneapolis, where Mr. Bancroft took a claim and improved a farm, making that his home until 1865, when he returned to Montpelier, Vt., where he yet resides, engaged in the manufacturing business. Mrs Bancroft died in 1861, leaving three children: ALice M., now the wife of George A. Town, of Whittier, Cal.; Mary, wife of John Falconer, of Brainerd, Minn.; Charles A., the subject of this sketch.

On the death of his mother Charles was but a child of two years. When his father removed back to Vermont, he was taken by Henry Paul, by whom he was reared, and with whom he lived until he was nineteen years old, receiving the advantages of a common-school education. At the age of seventeen he entered the offixce of the Anoka County Union to learn the printer's trade, where he remained three years. He then went to Brookings County, Dak., and took charge of his foster-mother's farm, following farming for the next two years. He then worked at his trade as a journeyman printer in different places for one year, when he returned to Brookings County, Dak., and located at Elkton in 1884, where he established the Elkton Record, which he published for eighteen months, and then sold out and embarked in the Restaurant business, in which line he continued for but three months. Selling out he came to West Liberty in 1886, where he was employed as a printer in the office of the Enterprise for nine months, when he purchased the paper, and has since been sole editor and proprietor. In this business he has been reasonably successful, the paper having a good circulation and a fine advertising patronage, while the job office attached has a fine trade.

In West Liberty he formed the acquaintance of Miss Henrietta D. Cornwall, a native of Cedar County, Iowa, and a daughter of V.R.Cornwall, of that county, and June 2, 1886, their marriage occurred. One son Clyde H., came to bless their wedded life, but on the 3d day of July, 1888, the wife and mother was called to her final home, leaving not alone the sorrowing husband and young child, who will never know a mother's love, but a large circle of friends and acquaintances to mourn her loss. She was a devoted member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and died in the hope of a future life, where all is happiness and where sorrow never comes.

Mr. Bancroft is also a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and belongs to Mount Calvary Lodge No. 95, A.F.& A.M.; to Liberty Chapter No 79, R.A.M.; and to Raymond Lodge No. 146, K.of P.

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