John Foster Furcolo (July 29, 1911 - July 5, 1995) was born in New Haven, Connecticut. Before serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, from 1942 to 1946, he graduated from Yale University in 1933 and Yale Law School in 1936. In 1948, he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, and served in Congress from 1949 to 1952, when he was elected State Treasurer and Receiver General of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, a position he held until 1954. An unsuccessful candidate for the U.S. Senate in 1954, Furcolo was elected Governor of Massachusetts in 1956, and served from 1957 to 1961.

During his administration, he established a network of regional community colleges throughout the Commonwealth and fought on behalf of increased state worker's salaries, workman's compensation and unemployment benefits. In 1960, he again ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate, then returned to the private practice of law. In 1969, he served on the U.S. Attorney General's Advisory Committee on Narcotics, and as an administrative law judge with the U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission from 1975 to 1989. He is the author of several books, including "Masacre At Katyn", an account of the Soviet masacre of Polish citizens in the Katyn Forest during World War II, which he learned of during his tenure on a congressional committee investigating the atrocities.

Governor Furcolo died on July 5, 1995, and is buried in Holyhood Cemetery in Brookline, Massachusetts.