Lowry Nelson was born in Ferron, Utah in April of 1893. He attended college in Utah and later earned a PhD at the University of Wisconsin. During his lifetime, he became a world-known sociologist.

Nelson earned a BS degree at Utah State University in 1916. He spent the next two decades working mainly in Utah. He served as the county agricultural agent in Sanpete County, Utah in 1919, he became the field agriculturist for the People's Sugar Company in 1920, and edited the Utah Farmer from 1920 to 1922. He was associated with Brigham Young University from 1921 to 1935. During the Depression, he worked for the Utah Relief Administration in 1934, he was regional advisor to the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, and in 1935 he became director of the Resettlement Administration. He was then director of the Utah Agricultural Experiment Station at Logan. In 1937, he received a position at the University of Minnesota in the Sociology Department.

During his tenure at the University of Minnesota, Nelson began to develop an international reputation as a rural sociologist. In 1944, he did a study for the State Department on rural life in the Caribbean. In 1945, he received a Fulbright to study rural life in Italy. Dr. Nelson continued his international work, taking an interest in different aspects of Canadian rural life.

Dr. Nelson's works include several monographs and a multitude of articles and papers ranging from rural life in Latin America, the United States, and Canada as well as studies on various Mormon villages in Utah. Dr. Nelson died in Provo, Utah in 1986.