Edward T. Graham studied up on condemnation law after his father-in-law's family farm near Batavia was swallowed up by the federal government in the late 1960s as part of the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory project.

Mr. Graham, at the time an attorney for Standard Oil of Indiana, became the legal adviser for many farmers whose land was in the path of the gigantic research lab. The experience of helping so many landowners gave Mr. Graham the confidence to branch out and open his own law firm in Wheaton, where he spent the next 40-plus years practicing primarily real estate law.

Read the full obituary in the Chicago Tribune