James D. Nelson

James D. Nelson was born on February 2, 1927.¹ Little is known about his early life. 

According to records within the White House Office of the Curator, Nelson worked at the White House from October 1954 until June 1986.² He appears on several White House staff lists over those years, always working in the Flower Shop.³ Nelson and his fellow florists designed arrangements made of fresh flowers and greenery for public and private areas of the White House. Nelson worked in close consultation with the Chief Floral Designer Elmer Young, first ladies and their social secretaries to prepare arrangements for State Dinners, weddings, and other White House functions. 

When President John F. Kennedy was assassinated on November 22, 1963, Nelson and Chief Florist Elmer M. Young “worked all through the night” to prepare the floral arrangements for the funerary laying-in-repose of Kennedy’s body in the East Room. Nelson also helped decorate the catafalque, or platform on which Kennedy’s casket lay in the U.S. Capitol Building the following day. Afterwards, Nelson went to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House where he helped set up temporary rooms to receive the over 500 flower arrangements sent to the White House from people all over the world. Nelson recalled that they donated the majority “to hospitals and homes for the aged.”⁴ 

Nelson continued to work in the White House Flower Shop until he retired in 1986, by which time he was the assistant chief floral designer.⁵ Little is known about his life beyond this.