[1] Nelson was born in January 1924 in Long Beach, California, the grandson of Nebraska Senator George William Norris.
Prior to entering government service, Nelson was a political science instructor at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine from 1950 to 1951.
He returned to the department as a political analyst in the Office of Intelligence Research from 1955 to 1957 and then took Finnish language training at the Foreign Service Institute.
From 1979 to 1980 he was a diplomat-in-residence at Arizona State University in Tempe, AZ, and from 1980 to 1984 he was deputy commandant for international affairs at the U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
On July 11, 1985, President Ronald Reagan announced his intention to nominate Nelson, a member of the Senior Foreign Service, to be Ambassador of the United States of America to the Kingdom of Swaziland.