Walter

Walter is oak wainscoting and a good fountain pen. From the Old Germanic Waltheri — wald, "rule," plus heri, "army" — it crossed the Channel with the Normans, anchored English literature through Sir Walter Scott, and gave America Walt Whitman, Walt Disney, and the unlikely late-career fame of Breaking Bad's Walter White. The name peaked in the 1910s in the US top 15, drifted far down by the 1990s, and is now climbing back into the early grandpa-chic revival at 271. Two firm syllables, the warm L, the soft final R. Substantial without being stiff, bookish without being fragile. A name with shoulders.