They are now among leaders of a very small but impassioned effort by some Rohrer fans to mount a write-in effort for their man in the Nov. 3 general election for governor.
The odds against such a campaign succeeding are monumental. Gov. Rendell got almost 2.5 million votes in his last election in 2006. Even the loser, Republican Lynn Swann, got 1.6 million votes.
Rohrer himself has not said if he would encourage a write-in effort. He said he wanted to see if it got "any real legs" before making any comment.
The Nelmses aren't daunted. They intend to build one write-in vote at a time.
"Sam is so unique," said Sue Nelms, who, like her husband, has a background in computers. "I am only 40, but I don't know if I will see anything like him ever again. He is made of the same stuff as the founding fathers."
Last Monday night, the Nelmses held an organizational meeting for Lancaster County Rohrer supporters at a Bob Evans restaurant at the Rockville Square outlet mall. Just a handful of people showed up. But the gathering was "on short notice," Sue Nelms said.
One legacy of Rohrer's candidacy was that it drew in people, such as the Nelmses, who had no experience with election activism.
Naively, in retrospect, many believed that Rohrer would win - even though the nine-term state House member from Berks County was always the longest of long shots, with little campaign money and no help from party leaders, who almost unanimously had endorsed Corbett.
Many Rohrer loyalists felt adrift when he lost.
Sue Mercer, of Terre Hill, Lancaster County, said she stewed for a while in her disillusionment - then decided to aid a write-in effort.
"Voting for Tom Corbett will be like having a Dem in the gov. seat!" she wrote recently on a Facebook page called "We will write in Sam Rohrer in November."
