Walter Gray died at home of heart disease on September 13, 2008. Walter, also known as Jack, was born on August 26, 1926 to the late Bessie Smith and Walter Gray. He grew up in South Baltimore, attending St. Monica Catholic School and Baltimore City Public Schools, ultimately graduating from Carver Vocational Technical High School. After serving in the United States Army infantry as part of the occupational force in Japan at the end of World War II, he used the GI Bill to attend Hampton Institute now, University. At Hampton, he was a varsity scholar-athlete who eventually won the CIAA heavyweight boxing crown in 1952 and served as co-captain of the football team. He fulfilled a childhood dream when he graduated from Hampton in 1953 with a degree in architectural civil engineering, a fild that had interested him since childhood. After working in a couple of civil engineering jobs, he was hired in 1956 by the Construction Service of the Veterans Administration now the Dept. of Vetern Affairs. During his long career with the VA, he work his way up from junior positions supervising the building and renovation of nursing homes and hospitals in Marion, Indiana, Battle Creek, Michigan, Roxbury, MA., Willming, DE., Washington, D.C. and New York City. In 1966, he was promoted and became what the Baltimore Afro-American newspaper described as "the first of his race" to be named Senior Resident Engineer for the VA. In subsequent years, he supervised staffs of up to 400 people in the building of multi-million dollar hospitals in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Tampa, FL., the Bronx, NY. and Baltimore, MD. Between building hospitals, he was also responsible for smaller projects such as nursing homes, funerary buildings and recreation facilities in St. Petersburg, Fl., Philadelphia, PA., and Quantico, VA. His final hospital was bounded in part by the same corner- Greene and Baltimore Streets-where he sold newspapers as a boy. He retired in January 1994. While visiting Baltimore from Battle Creek in December 1957, his close friend Roland Brown introduced him to Eula Blackman, a junior high school teach from Fairfield who was working on her master's degree at the time. They were married on August 8, 1959. At the time, he was living in Indiana but he insisted that his new wife remain in Baltimore to complete her education. Their first child, Jacquelyn was born while they were stationed in the Boston area. Monica and Shari were born in Baltimore while he commuted to Washington and Delaware; and Walter III was born in Puerto Rico. After devoting most of his working life to housing, feeding, educating and entertaining his family, Walter decided to pursue a dream of his own-to visit every continent on earth. He fulfilled this trips to Africa, Europe, Australia, Nortgh and South America, Asia his first time since serving as an occupying force in Japan and the Philippines at the end of WW II and Antarctica. A devout Catholic for most of his life, he gave a great deal of his time to New All Saints Church including serving on the usher board and dedicated engineer skills to help renovate the church and school buildings. Although he had earned a master's degree in business administration from Inter American University in Puerto Rico in 1970 and took prefessional development courses throughout his career, he never lost his love of learning. From the time he retired, Walter took at least two courses every semester at Baltimore City Community College and he had bought this semester's books just before he entered the hospital for the final time. He is survived by his wife Eula; his children Jacquelyn, Monica, Shareyfah and Walter III; his nephew Malcolm Gray; his cousins, friends and colleagues. He was preceded in death by his parents, and his younger brothers Jerome and Earl.