Leon Lewis (Lee) Nims, son of William and Fannie Nims, was born in Eau Claire Co, WI April 24, 1876. At about two years of age Lee traveled with his parents to California, starting in a horse drawn boat on wheels and finishing the trip in an oxen drawn covered wagon, arriving in California about 1878. About 1879 the family moved to Seattle via freight boat, then to Bellingham, back to Seattle, and finally to Sumas around 1889.
On his first job working at Mission, B.C. in the woods he got up at 3:00 each morning and worked until 9:00 p.m.. About 1892 he moved to Goshen where he was a logger, falling and bucking timber with cross cut saws, and later moved to Fairhaven (South Bellingham) where he worked on a log boom.
Ethel Lillian Buell, the daughter of Charles Edward Buell and Vandelia Larsonier, was born July 27, 1886 in Morristown, NY. Ethel moved with the family to Chicago about 1891, and in 1898 came west on a train to Tacoma. They lived about a year in Mt. Vernon, then moved to Fairhaven (South Bellingham), where she was living when she met Lee Nims. Lee married Ethel, then 15 years old, on August 28, 1901 in Fairhaven, Whatcom Co, Washington, and they moved onto a farm four miles east of Sumas that Lee had purchased around 1899.
Lee and Ethel cleared and farmed 80 acres adjacent to the Canadian border and later purchased an additional 40 acres about two miles to the west. In addition to operating a thirty-cow dairy, they raised wheat, vetch, red clover seed, hay, pole beans, sugar beets, and dry peas. All farming was done with a team of horses until about 1923 when a Fordson tractor was purchased.
Lee and Ethel built a two-bedroom house facing the wagon road along the slough, and later added a third bedroom and living room. All of their nine children were born in this house, where they continued to live until they purchased a house in Bellingham for their later years.
Lee died December 9, 1939 in Bellingham, at age 63. His body was interred in Sumas, Whatcom Co, WA.
Ethel was visiting her son Frank in California when her heart condition became critical and she passed away in the local hospital. She died September 13, 1944 in Kentfield, CA, at age 58, and was buried in Sumas.
(Census 1900 Fairhaven, 1910 Prairie and 1920 Nooksack, all Whatcom Co, Washington, marriage certificate and personal knowledge of Fred and Frank Nims).
Lee and Ethel had the following children:
| Gladys Irene Nims | Born in 1903 |
| Clarence Hubert Nims | Born in Sumas in 1905. Clarence died September 21, 1926 at age 21. |
| Edward Leon Nims | Born in 1908 |
| Walter Raybert Nims | Born in 1910 |
| Lowell Nims | Born and died in 1912. |
| Ruth Aileen Nims | Born in 1914 |
| Francis Leslie "Frank" Nims | Born in 1917 |
| Buell Eugene Nims | Born in 1920 |
| Vernon Dean Nims | Born in 1926 |
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