Albert Francke, a retired corporate lawyer, former Navy Seal and avid sportsman, died of natural causes on March 3 at Peconic Landing, an assisted living facility in Greenport. He was 90.
Francke, the son of the late Eleanor Fitzgerald Francke and Albert Francke Jr, grew up in Manhattan in New York City. His mother ran the household and volunteered at several charitable institutions and his father was an executive at Ernst & Ernst, certified public accountants.
Francke attended the Allen-Stevenson school, St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, and graduated from Yale in 1956, where he was a member of the Fence Club.
A lieutenant in the U.S. Naval Reserve, Francke spent the next two years in the U.S. Navy, where he became a member of the underwater demolition team, the forerunner of the Navy SEALS. His team worked with the first astronauts, mimicking weightlessness under water, and at one point, was tasked with blowing up a coral reef off the officer’s beach club, which was cutting the feet of Navy wives and their children. Overestimating the amount of explosives necessary, his UDT team blew up the Beach Club as well.
Francke continued his education after the Navy at Stanford Law School, graduating in 1961, and joined the law firm of Curtis, Mallet, Prevost, Colt & Mosle in New York. He served as managing partner from 1987-1990, and opened a branch of the firm in London between 1992 and 1994. He was on the board of directors of Fidelity European Values and the Property Letting Centre in London and served as a member of county overseers of Tweedy Brown International N.V.
Dividing his time between New York and Bridgehampton, where his parents owned property on Sagaponack Pond and the ocean beach, Francke renovated a small beach shack into a stilted home. He was a frequent participant in bird shoots at Schellinger’s Spring Farm in Sag Harbor and at the former Mashomack Fish and Game Club on Shelter Island.
He continued his love of hunting and the outdoors after he retired and moved to a farm in Millerton, New York, with his wife, Rose Marie. He was generous to the community, donating 100 acres of wetlands to The Nature Conservancy, as well as many trees to line the streets of the town.
During the Vietnam War, Francke volunteered his service as a Navy Seal, but was turned down by his maternal uncle, Desmond Fitzgerald, deputy director of plans for the CIA. “I couldn’t bear telling my sister that her son had died when I could have prevented it,” Fitzgerald said.
He is survived by his wife of 15 years, Rose Marie Morse of New York; as well as his children from his first marriage to Linda Bird Francke, Caitlin Francke Boyle of Chatham New Jersey, Tapp Francke Ingolia of Sag Harbor, and stepson Andrew Mackenzie of Sauk Centre, Minnesota. His second marriage to Renee Vollen ended in divorce, and his third to Katherine Baily, with her death. His sister, Nora Francke Cammann, predeceased him.
Staff Writer on Mar 4, 2025