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Walter P. Müther, the photographer's maternal grandfather, lived from 1890 to 1989. Engineer, daredevil pilot (shot down twice in World War I without a parachute), gardener, devoted MIT alumnus, loving parent and lusty bon vivant, he enjoyed life to the fullest, always making time to smell the roses. Born in Chicago, Illinois, he spent his early years in suburban Oak Park and often played scratch baseball with neighborhood kids, including future author Ernest Hemingway and his brothers. While he was in middle school the family moved to Colorado and he loved camping, fishing for steelhead, and hiking the rugged trails of the Rocky Mountains. Love of fresh air and the outdoors was to prove a lifelong passion. He is remembered for his gregarious nature, socializing, entertaining, and generous dollops of booze -- manufactured in the bathtub during Prohibition, and usually present in a silver hip flask through his golden and platinum years. After returning from WWI, he met and married Marion Hyde, a concert pianist who had the temerity to offer piano lessons in her parlor (completely shocking the proper Bostonians she lived amongst). They had one child, who later became the mother of your photographer and his two siblings, Cynthia and James. Shown here at age 92, Walter proudly displays a braid of his home-grown elephant garlic at the family home he bought near Northampton, Massachusetts.