Galvin, John T., 1914-1994

John Thomas Galvin was born on December 26, 1914 in Boston, MA, to Thomas J. and Agnes M. Hughes Galvin. He was an alumnus of both Boston College High (class of 1931) and Boston College (Class of 1937). He married journalist Ruth Mehrtens Galvin (1922-2002) in 1968, and they had no children. He died on September 19, 1994 at Youville Hospital in Cambridge, MA.

John Galvin handled press and publicity for the Boston Community Fund Campaign (now United Way) after graduating from Boston College, and then enlisted in the United States Navy in 1940. He served in the Navy during World War II in the campaigns of the Solomon Islands, Philippines, and Iwo Jima, and the occupation of Japan, and he remained a Captain in the Naval Reserve until his retirement in 1973. Upon returning to Massachusetts after World War II, he began a career as a public relations director, working for the John C. Dowd Advertising Agency (1946-1956), Massachusetts Federation of Taxpayers Association, Inc. (1947-1957), the World Trade Center in Boston (1957-1966), and Tuft-New England Medical Center. He was a communications consultant for BC President W. Seavey Joyce, SJ.

Galvin also wrote extensively, contributing articles and book reviews to the Boston Herald American, Coronet, the Washington Star, the New England Quarterly, Dictionary of American Biography, and other publications.

Galvin had a strong interest in local politics, dedicating most of his research, writing, and extra-professional time to it. He worked closely with John F. Kennedy’s campaigns for Congress, including writing his 1946 campaign announcement and serving as his public relations advisor in 1952. He was the executive director of the Boston Citizens Council from 1954 to 1957. While Raymond Flynn was mayor of Boston, Galvin served as an associate commissioner of the Boston Parks Department. The preservation and enhancement of Boston’s parks and buildings served as the focal point for his involvement with the Friends of the Public Garden and the George B. Henderson Foundation.

In 1954, Galvin and W. Seavey Joyce, SJ, then dean of the College of Business Administration at Boston College, founded the Boston Citizen Seminars, a series of sessions bringing together business, professional, and labor leaders in Boston to discuss urban renewal. Galvin continued as the program chairman of the Seminars until 1962.