John Hare, 1st Viscount Blakenham

John Hugh Hare, 1st Viscount Blakenham, OBE, PC, DL (22 January 1911 – 7 March 1982) was a British Conservative politician.

Blakenham was an Alderman of London County Council between 1937 and 1952 and fought in the Second World War with the Suffolk Yeomanry in Italy and was awarded the Legion of Honour and appointed an OBE.

[1] Blakenham then served under Sir Alec Douglas-Home as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster and Deputy Leader of the House of Lords from 1963 to 1964 and was chairman of the Conservative Party between 1963 and 1965.

They had three children: In 1967, Joanna married American attorney and Harvard Law School professor Stephen Breyer; Breyer would be appointed a Circuit Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in 1980 and a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States in 1994.

His son, Michael Blakenham, a lifelong environmentalist has increased the stock of unusual specimens and has bought many rare including unnamed trees and shrubs from auctions at Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.