From the age of nine, John Bancroft knew he wanted to be a doctor, and by the age of fourteen, a psychiatrist. He trained at Cambridge University and Saint George’s Hospital, Londo...view moreFrom the age of nine, John Bancroft knew he wanted to be a doctor, and by the age of fourteen, a psychiatrist. He trained at Cambridge University and Saint George’s Hospital, London, and qualified in medicine in 1960. He went on to train in psychiatry at the Maudsley Hospital, London, and in 1969 moved to Oxford to help his colleague, Michael Gelder, establish a new University Department of Psychiatry. Over the next few years, he became increasingly interested in human sexuality, and in 1976, he moved to the Medical Research Council’s Reproductive Biology Unit in Edinburgh. He was there for the next nineteen years until he was appointed director of the Kinsey Institute for Research in Sex, Gender, and Reproduction in Indiana University in the United States. Of his many publications, the principal one is Human Sexuality & Its Problems, Third Edition (Elsevier, 2009).
He has been married twice and has fathered five children. His first wife, Judy Greenwood, is also a psychiatrist. His second wife, Cynthia Graham, is a clinical psychologist. Music has played a large part in his life. Apart from playing jazz piano himself, his first three children—Sophie, Tom, and Phil—are professional jazz musicians. His younger son, Jack, is showing promise as a guitarist. In contrast, his daughter Rosie is a world class swimmer.
He retired in 2004, since when he has been living with his wife Cynthia and children Rosie and Jack in his paradise just outside Oxford, which he has owned since 1969.
He has had a full and rewarding life, for which he is very grateful.view less