The 1915 wedding of Humphrey and Doris Nelson

Humphrey "Hump" Nelson was one of the premier oyster growers in early Mason County. His family moved from Michigan to Tacoma in 1888, when he was about 2 years old. Not long after they arrived, Hump's father went to work for the Blakely Logging Co. and moved his family to the Kamilche area, where as a young man he got his start in the oyster business. Around 1965, he wrote his autobiography, "The Little Man and the Little Oyster," published by the Mason County Historical Society in 1990. This excerpt tells the story of how Hump and his wife met and married.

When their father died in spring 1915, Hump (shown in photo) and his brother Herbert continued to work in the oyster beds for "Mr. Young," to keep the family home and pay off bills resulting from their father's illness. In July, a neighborhood couple told Hump he should come up and meet the nice young widow visiting them. So Hump "slicked up a little" and went to the neighbors to meet Doris. Here is Hump's story about what happened next.

"The better I got to know Doris, the better I liked her. When the day came for her to leave, I asked her to stay a while longer. Finally, I told her that I could almost make a living alone, and if she could help a little, I would like to marry her. She said she thought she could help, and we set a wedding date of September 25.

"Next, my mind was on building a nest for Doris. Her friends Mr. and Mrs. Brownfield suggested boarding up one end of their woodshed as a sleeping room. We could all board together and split the expense. I went to work on the woodshed in my spare time, and we were all happy about it. Every evening after supper I'd go to see Doris and spend the evening planning for our home, our business, and, of course, our family. I stayed each evening until the moon passed over a certain tree top.

"Soon after our engagement, Mom and my two brothers bought a Model T Ford. Doris and I used it before we got married. I found it to be one of the meanest things to keep on the road that I ever drove. About three weeks before our wedding, I was more or less herding the old Ford along with my left arm, my right arm around Doris. She asked me what time it was, I took my left hand from the steering wheel to reach for my watch, and that Ford whirled and took for the woods. The front wheels went up a steep bank, and the motor stopped. There we sat at a 45-degree angle. We hunted a pole, put it under the back wheel, and the car backed down to the road.

"Our wedding date finally arrived. We had planned a simple wedding in Olympia by a minister or justice, and a quick return home. My mother, Mr. Young, and Mr. and Mrs. Brownfield all piled into the Ford with us, and away we went. It was Saturday, and it turned out that no one was home. We hadn't made any arrangements ahead for this part of the event. By midafternoon, Doris wanted to go home and try again Monday. I said, 'Nothing doing, we will be married today if we have to go to Seattle.' At the last moment, we did find a minister at home and were soon on our way to becoming man and wife.

"All the money I had to do the job was $30. I'd already spent part of it on treats, without which I'd be in trouble when I got home. All I had left was a $20 bill. When I handed it to the minister, expecting change, he handed the twenty to his wife. So, broke again, we all piled in the Model T and took off for home.

"Right after our supper, I made ready, knowing the people around us were just waiting for it to get dark. I'd bought an 8-gallon keg of beer. The barkeeper made me a wedding present of three bottles of champagne, and we also had milder treats for the ladies and the little ones. The partiers went around and around the house with every noisemaker they could find, wondering why I didn't come out, until someone realized I was right out there making noise with them.

"As the evening wore on, the boys got pretty happy but still hadn't reached the bottom of the keg. I brought out the champagne. By the time the third cork popped, they were wheeling each other to the keg in a little boy's wagon. Everyone left by midnight. I had to be at work for Mr. Young at 2:30 a.m., so only had a few minutes to relax. As I walked down the path to the gate, I noticed three of the boys asleep on a stack of new-mown hay. The others who hadn't had their wives to help them were a short distance down the road. I came back about 6 a.m. after working while the tide was low, and found that the boys on the haystack had moved on. Just who got the good send-off, you can guess."

■ Jan Parker is a researcher for the Mason County Historical Museum. She can be reached at [email protected]. Membership in the Mason County Historical Society is $25 per year. For a limited time, new members will receive a free copy of the book "Shelton, the First Century Plus Ten."