Beverley Bolt

September 1, 1932 – January 21, 2019

Beverley Bolt, 86, passed away in her Berkeley home on January 21, 2019. Beverley was born to Ruth and Herbert Bentley in Sydney, Australia, on September 1, 1932, and graduated from Fort Street Girls’ High School. She attended The University of Sydney where at age 21 she received her B.Sc. and was the first woman to be awarded the University Medal for Mathematics. After completing her M.Sc. in 1955 and her Ph.D. in Pure Mathematics in 1960, she spent a year at Columbia University in New York on a Fulbright Scholarship.

Beverley was married for 49 years to Bruce A. Bolt who predeceased her in 2005. In 1963, they emigrated from Australia to the United States when he was appointed a professor of seismology at the University of California at Berkeley. Beverley continued her mathematical endeavors as a lecturer at Sydney University, Cambridge University, and U.C. Berkeley, and through collaboration with Bruce on numerous seismological studies and publications. For many years, she worked as a mathematical editor at U.C. Berkeley’s Earthquake Engineering Research Center.

In addition to her mathematical gifts, Beverley was a keen tennis player, an expansive reader and an avid theatre-goer, making annual trips to the Ashland Shakespeare Festival. She was a member of the Town & Gown Club and an active participant in many U.C section clubs. While she and Bruce traveled the world together, attending scientific conferences at farflung institutions, she always maintained a particular affection for England where they spent frequent sabbaticals in Cambridge and London. She also loved the Sierra Nevada mountains, especially hiking and attending the music festival in Bear Valley with her family and friends.

Beverley is survived by her four children, Gillian Kohli and her husband Bill of Wellesley, MA; Robert Bolt of Burlingame, CA; Helen Juarez and her husband Francisco of West Linn, OR; Margaret Barber and her husband Ben of Orinda, CA; her sister Olwyn Gunter of Sydney, Australia and sixteen grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held Thursday, March 7 at 4:00pm at The Faculty Club on the U.C. Berkeley campus.