John Henry Boalt (March 29, 1837 in Norwalk, Ohio – May 9, 1901 in Cloverdale, California) was an attorney who resided in Oakland, California in the late 19th century. Education After graduating from Amherst College in 1857, Boalt attended the University of Heidelberg School of Mining. Career He left Germany to enlist in the Union Army and was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Eleventh Ohio Cavalry as a member of the Signal Corps in the American Civil War. He served throughout the rest of the War. After the War, he moved west to Nevada with his wife Elizabeth Josselyn Boalt in 1867 and worked in mining, but soon entered the legal profession. He became a judge in Nevada in 1870 before moving to Oakland in 1871, where he started the San Francisco law firm of Estee & Boalt where he was a partner until 1884. In 1889, he became a member of the leading west coast law firm Garber, Boalt & Bishop handling cases involving mining law and operations, including one where he acted for the City of San Francisco, and was president of the local Bar association, Library Trustee of the city of Oakland, and member of the Bohemian Club. He retired in 1892. Personal life Boalt married Elizabeth Josselyn (born Hanover, Massachusetts 30 June 1838) on 31 July 1866, in Waverly, Massachusetts, and together they had one child, Alice Boalt Tevis, first wife of Hugh Tevis. She died unexpectedly; her death was "a blow from which Judge Boalt never recovered". At his death due to heart failure, his only surviving relatives were his wife and granddaughter, Alice, who later died at age 10. After Boalt's death in 1901, his widow, Elizabeth Josselyn Boalt, created a trust allocating two parcels of land in San Francisco valued at $100,000 to be sold for the benefit of the University of California to construct a building to house its new School of Jurisprudence on the Berkeley campus. Six weeks later, the 1906 earthquake destroyed the properties. The trustees were able to sell only one parcel, for far less than the original value. In recognition of the gift, the new building was named Boalt Memorial Hall of Law. In 1906, she created a further trust, whereby, subject to a life estate and certain powers of revocation, she transferred substantially all of her remaining estate "to establish and endow a professorship in the