Michael Dukakis

Michael Stanley Dukakis (born November 3, 1933) is an American politician. He served as Governor of Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979, and from 1983 to 1991, making him the longest-serving governor in the history of the state. In 1988, Dukakis won the Democratic Party's nomination for the presidency in the 1988 election, and nominated Lloyd Bentsen, a senator from Texas and 1976 presidential candidate for vice president. He lost to Republican candidate George H. W. Bush, partly due to Bush's portrayal of Dukakis as soft on crime, defense and too liberal for the American populace.

In 1990, he was not a candidate for re-election as governor, and he was succeeded by William Weld, a Republican. His cousin, Olympia Dukakis, is an Academy Award-winning actress.

Personal life

The son of first-generation American immigrants, Michael Stanley Dukakis was born in Brookline, Massachusetts to Panos Dukakis, who left his village of Pelopi, Greece, a tiny village in close proximity to Turkey, to come to the United States. He attended Harvard Medical School and graduated in 1922, becoming an obstetrician. His mother, the former Euterpe Boukis was an immigrant from Larissa who worked as a school teacher; Michael's parents met after both immigrated to America. He had one brother, Stelian Panos Dukakis (born 1930), who was killed during a hit-and-run accident in 1973.