Luis A. Ferré

Don Luis Alberto Ferré Aguayo (February 17, 1904 – October 21, 2003), most commonly known as Luis A. Ferré, was a Puerto Rican engineer, industrialist, politician, philanthropist, and patron of the arts who served as the third democratically elected governor of Puerto Rico from 1969 to 1973. Ferré previously served as an at-large member of the House of Representatives of Puerto Rico from 1953 to 1957. After his governorship, he served as the eighth president of the Senate of Puerto Rico from 1977 to 1981. Founder of the pro-statehood New Progressive Party in 1967, Ferré opposed the political status of Puerto Rico as an unincorporated territory of the United States, promoting instead Puerto Rican statehood, or the incorporation of the archipelago and island into the United States as a state. He advocated support for the admission of Puerto Rico into the Union from the start of his political career as an unsuccessful nominee for Resident Commissioner of Puerto Rico under the Puerto Rican Statehood Party in 1948. He was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President George H. W. Bush in 1989.

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