Walter Butler was the oldest Butler brother and the first president of the Butler Brothers Construction Company, the general contractor for the construction of the Capitol. Born in 1858, he began as a bricklayer and union activist in the Bricklayer's Union, having served as union president of the Bricklayer's Benevolent Union Local 1 in 1884 and 1885. As the employer of the capitol project, he would not have been an active union member at that time.