Gabriel Bouck prepared for college at Schoharie Academy and The Albany Academy. In 1847, he graduated from Union College with Phi Beta Kappa honors and membership in the Kappa Alpha Society. He studied law in the Binghamton, New York offices of Daniel S. Dickinson. Bouck moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1848, where he attained admission to the bar. In 1849, he moved to Oshkosh, in Winnebago County, Wisconsin, to practice law. The 1860 Census listed him as a resident of Oshkosh's third ward.