Eisenhardt was born to a middle-class, Roman Catholic family and grew up in South Orange, New Jersey, the son of Catheryn T. and Emil Henry Eisenhardt. His father was the director of purchasing at a local university and his mother was a professor of English and Linguistics.
He attended Columbia High School in Maplewood, New Jersey and then graduated from Dartmouth College in 1960.
After school he served two years in the United States Marine Corps in Okinawa before returning to the United States to attend law school at University of California Berkeley School of Law where he graduated in 1965. He then went to Germany to study tax law and upon returning, worked in business law at the firm of Farella, Braun, & Martel in San Francisco and then in 1975, he began teaching at University of California Berkeley School of Law. In 1980, he served as president of Major League Baseball"s Oakland Athletics then owned by his father-in-law, Walter A. Haas, Junior. who he had helped to negotiate the purchase of the A"s from Charles O. Finley for $12.7 million.
He served as president from 1981-1986.
