John Harvard (November 26, 1607 - September 14, 1638) was a Massachusetts clergyman after whom Harvard University is named.

He was born and raised in London, in the borough of Southwark, the fourth of nine children, the son of Robert Harvard (1562-1625), a butcher and tavern owner, and his wife, Katherine Rogers (1584-1635), a native of Stratford-on-Avon whose father, Thomas Rogers (1540-1611), is sometimes thought to have been an associate of William Shakespeare (1564-1616). John Harvard was educated at St Saviour's Grammar School in Southwark, where his father Robert was a governor.

In 1625, his father, a stepsister, and two brothers died of the plague. Of his immediate family, only his mother and one brother, Thomas, remained. She remarried to John Elletson (1580-1626) who died within months of their marriage, and then to Richard Yearwood (1580-1632) in 1627. Harvard entered Emmanuel College, Cambridge, then a Puritan stronghold, in December 1627 and received his B.A. in 1632. Katherine died in 1635 and Thomas in the spring of 1637. John married Ann Sadler (1614-1655), of Ringmer, Sussex, in April, 1636, daughter of the Rev. John Sadler and sister of Harvard's contemporary, John Sadler, the lawyer and orientalist.

In May 1637 he emigrated with his wife to New England and settled in Charlestown, Massachusetts where many of his classmates had arrived before him. Charlestown made him the minister of the Church, but within the following year he contracted tuberculosis and died on September 14, 1638. He is buried at the Phipps Street Cemetery in Charlestown.

Childless, Harvard bequeathed £779 (half of his estate) and his library of around 400 volumes to the New College at nearby Cambridge, which had been founded on September 8, 1636, and to his friend, the first schoolmaster of this college, Nathaniel Eaton. Eaton's Records indicate that the building of the new college began immediately in 1638 with the assistance of the carpenter Thomas Meakins and/or his son, Thomas Meakins, Jr. of Charlestown. It was completely constructed of wood with a stone foundation and cellar, had its own apple orchard, and was apparently equipped with live-in accommodations for some 30 students as there were at least that many attendant within the first year.

The school renamed itself "Harvard College" on March 13, 1639, and Harvard was first referred to as a university rather than a college by the new Massachusetts constitution of 1780.

No records or illustrations remain of the earliest college, which burnt to the ground in 1674 along with all but one of Harvard's original 400 volume donation.

John Harvard PC OM (born June 4, 1938 in Glenboro, Manitoba) is a journalist, politician and office holder in Manitoba, Canada. He served as a federal MP from 1988 to 2004, and was appointed Lieutenant-Governor of Manitoba just before Canada's 2004 federal election.

Harvard was a broadcast journalist from 1957 to 1988. He worked for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation for eighteen years and was for many years the host of a popular call-in show in Winnipeg. Coincidentally, his predecessor as lieutenant-governor, Peter M. Liba, worked as a journalist for CBC's competitor CanWest.

Harvard was elected to the Canadian House of Commons in the 1988 election as a Liberal, defeating incumbent Progressive Conservative George Minaker by 18,695 votes to 16,993 in the middle-class suburban riding of Winnipeg—St. James (in the previous election, the Liberal candidate had finished third). Harvard sat as a backbench member of the parliamentary opposition from 1988 to 1993.

The Liberal Party won the 1993 federal election, and Harvard was easily re-elected in Winnipeg—St. James, defeating his nearest competitor, Reformer Peter Blumenschein, by about 13,000 votes. He was not appointed to cabinet, but was named Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Public Works and Government Services in 1996.

Harvard was again re-elected without difficulty in the federal election of 1997, running in the redistributed riding of Charleswood--Assiniboia. He was named Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-Food after the election, serving until 1998.

Harvard faced his most difficult bid for re-election in the 2000 campaign, narrowly defeating Canadian Alliance challenger Cyril McFate by 13,901 votes to 11,569. Progressive Conservative Curtis Moore finished third with 9991 votes, causing many to regard the riding as winnable for a "united right" in the next election.

Harvard supported Paul Martin for the Liberal Party leadership over a period of several years, and it was perhaps for this reason that he was never called into the cabinet of Jean Chrétien. As early as 2000, Harvard publicly suggested that Chrétien should consider resigning as party leader. When Martin became prime minister on December 12, 2003, Harvard was sworn in to the Privy Council as parliamentary secretary to the minister of international trade.

Harvard resigned his parliamentary seat on May 6, 2004. It is rumoured that this was done at the urging of Winnipeg mayor Glen Murray, who was seeking the Liberal candidacy for a Winnipeg-area riding in the upcoming federal election. It was announced the next day that Harvard would be appointed lieutenant-governor of Manitoba, and he was officially sworn in on June 30. Murray was unable to retain the seat for the Liberals.

The position of lieutenant-governor is largely ceremonial, and Harvard holds very little direct influence over the government of Manitoba.

In October 2005 John Harvard was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from the University of Manitoba.