A millionaire and a railroad enthusiast, Blount's collection of vintage steam locomotives and rail cars—originally based in New England—was one of the largest ever assembled and still remains the cornerstone of the modern-day Steamtown National Historic Site.

On May 23, 1933, just after his fifteenth birthday, Blount skipped school to see the famous British steamer, Royal Scot, on exhibition in Providence, Rhode Island, en route to the Chicago World's Fair.

Nelson had wanted to enlist in the Navy, yet a leg injury and a broken back suffered when falling off a wharf had triggered a return of his childhood undulant fever in 1939, and he was declared unfit for service.

Instead of serving in the military, Blount married Ruth Palmer, whose mother had coincidentally been high school classmates with Nelson's parents, on October 10, 1942.

Blount used some of the money that he made in the seafood industry to purchase the narrow gauge Edaville Railroad in South Carver, Massachusetts, in the mid-1950s.

Subsequently, on April 26, 1961, Blount and his associates founded a separate standard-gauge tourist excursion railroad, the Monadnock, Steamtown & Northern, to provide the steam train rides.

Blount hoped to commit the state of New Hampshire to fund the museum's construction and offered 20 of his steam locomotives as an incentive; meanwhile, he would control the Monadnock, Steamtown & Northern, which was to be the separate excursion operator on the B&M Cheshire Branch.

This was the first year that the collection was open to the public (as opposed to just MS&N train rides), and soon it was decided that the North Walpole site was too small for the many visitors who came.

[2] With state interest waning, Blount established the "Steamtown Foundation for the Preservation of Steam and Railroad Americana", a non-profit charitable, educational organization to acquire his collection and operate the museum.

Blount envisioned a 40-stall roundhouse, a station, yard tracks, steamboat operations on the Connecticut River, and a model New England village complete with a country church and electric street railway.

In 1964 and 1965, Blount established the Green Mountain Railroad to provide freight service to the beleaguered on-line customers and employ his excursion staff in the off season.

[2] By 1967 Blount planned to distance himself from the business affairs of the Steamtown Foundation, hoping to find a replacement as chairman and focus mainly on being a steam locomotive engineer.

[4] Nelson was an experienced flyer and had owned many aircraft; he had performed a pre-flight check and is believed to have planned to stop at Keene Airport for refueling.

The crash had been found near the border of the village of Chesham, New Hampshire, and the town of Marlborough, about 5 miles (8.0 km) from Nelson's home in Dublin.