This crazy, histrionic and sneaky game has brought so much joy to my groups over the years, I do admit that I save it for the most deserving of my groups. I hope you enjoy it, too.
Your most critical task is to find a good, solid table that can seat at least 4 people each on opposing sides. Divide your teams as desired, or go with a random option from Getting Into Teams.
If you get the feeling that eight people facing each other across a table is going to be competitive, then … you’d be right.
Showing it off in your hand as you speak, announce that the whole point of this game is to claim and retain possession of the coin.
Begin by giving the coin to one of the two teams. A quick round of Rock-Paper-Scissors is as formal as you need to get when making this decision. The team with the coin is called the ‘hiding’ team, and their opponents are the ‘searching’ team.
Focusing on the searching team first, ask them to nominate a “Captain.” This person will have a very simple, yet critical role to play and it is equally critical that everyone – I mean, all members of both teams – know who the Captain is.
Meanwhile, instruct the hiding team to place their arms and hands below the table and begin to pass (or not pass) the coin to their other team members. The whole point is to hide the coin, so the searching team does not know who at any point in time has the coin.
Allow about 15 seconds or so for these sneaky passing motions to occur, and then the fun begins.
Announce that as soon as the Captain utters the command “UP NELSON” everyone on the hiding team must immediately and simultaneously raise their clenched hands (fingers facing forward) above the tabletop and slam their elbows on the tabletop.
Obviously, it is imperative that all members of the hiding team clench their hands because they want to keep the whereabouts of the coin secret for as long as possible.
Note, the simultaneous action of elbows on the table must only occur when the Captain, and only the Captain issues the “UP NELSON” command. Therein lies an opportunity for the searching team to trick the hiding team into revealing their hands too soon.
You see, if any member of the hiding team happens to raise one or both of their hands above the tabletop when someone other than the Captain makes the call, the searching team wins and the coin is passed to them (to start a new round.)
To be clear, anyone can say the words “UP NELSON,” but the hiding team must only react when the Captain utters this command lest they lose the coin. Yes, that is to say, this potential trickery is all a part of the game.
Moving on…
Then, with fists clenched and elbows on the table, any member of the searching team is entitled to call “DOWN NELSON” – at any time – at which point every member of the hiding team aims to immediately slap their palms onto the tabletop as simultaneously as possible, ie to hide the sound of the coin hitting the table.
That is, if there are five members of the hiding team, there will (ordinarily) be ten hands faced down on the table, with one of them hiding the coin. And this is the key – the searching team hopefully is unaware which hand is hiding the coin.
From this point forward, the searching team is tasked to work together to identify where they think the coin is. Other than the potential sound of the coin hitting the table (and sometimes, even spying the coin poking out from under a palm) the searching team has one other tool at its disposal – the squiggle.
At any time, the searching team can direct one or more members of the hiding team to squiggle or move their hands slightly in any direction, ie left, right, forward or back. Naturally, they are not permitted to direct a palm to extend past the edge of a table.
The searching team’s objective is to remove all hands from the table except for the one hiding the coin, ie they intend for the last hand on the table to be the one hiding the coin.
To remove a hand, all it requires is for someone from the searching team to touch it. To this end, the searching team must curb their excitement to touch the hand they know is hiding the coin.
If the coin is revealed before the last hand is removed, the hiding team wins and retains possession of the coin. Only when the last hand remaining (face down) reveals the coin does the searching team win and gain possession of the coin.
If the searching team fails in its attempt to locate the coin (under the last remaining hand,) it must nominate a new Captain to lead it into the next round.
If necessary, feel free to award a point for each round a team wins or record how many minutes each team possesses the coin. But, this really is not necessary – playing the game is its own reward.
Play as many rounds as time and/or energy allows.
If you want to get picky, a critical attribute of the table you choose to play on is its ability to hear a coin scrape across its surface. That is to say, if the table is so sturdy/solid/thick that it is impossible to hear a coin squiggle under a palm, then the game becomes a little more random and a lot less fun.
The two teams do not need to be even, but it makes for a more balanced contest when they are.
Other than sourcing more tables, if you have a large group, resist the temptation to form two very large teams of, say, 15+ people. Better to form multiple teams and swap teams in/out at the end of each round.
As Karl Rohnke describes when he wrote about Up Nelson in his book Quicksilver, “it’s a good game for the right place and the right time.”
Invariably, the people who show their hands too early are those who are holding the coin for the first nervous time. They are so focused on not dropping the coin and keeping it hidden, that they jump at the first command of “UP NELSON” regardless of who calls it. Always a delight to witness.
For the record, nominating a new Captain for each and every round is useful because it heightens the risk of someone on the hiding team raising their hands too early because they forgot who the current Captain was.
Some of the funniest moments of this game often belong to members of the hiding team. For example, when the coin is dropped mid-pass (under the table) and the coin is flicked across the room in the process of opening and slapping one’s hands down onto the table, to mention but two of many memories.
I have no idea why it’s called Up Nelson. I did learn it from a naval officer in the early 1990s, but I am not clear if this name is related to the famous 18th Century military leader Admiral Horatio Nelson.
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Have you played this activity? What worked, what didn't work? What type of group? Do you have useful advice for other users? Do you know a fun variation?