As a Washington County District Court judge, Howard Albertson often saw people at their worst. But on about 6,000 occasions, the job also gave him an opportunity to share in their happiest moments -- as an enthusiastic, twinkle-eyed wedding officiant.
Albertson, who just might be in more wedding photos than any other person in Minnesota, died on Jan. 31 at his May Township farm, a picturesque setting complete with a beautiful white Victorian gazebo that he and his wife, Ellen, created for many of those nuptials. He was 84. His funeral services are on Tuesday.
"He was really one of a kind," said Ellen Albertson, his wife of more than 52 years.
Howard Albertson was appreciated for his quirky humor, personal warmth and a compassion that permeated everything he did.
Along with serving as judge from 1972 until retiring in 1996, he was elected by Washington County voters to six terms as a state representative, starting in 1960. He chaired the House Judiciary Committee and, as chairman of the Metropolitan and Urban Affairs Committee, was chief architect of groundbreaking legislation that created the Metropolitan Council in 1967.
But it was helping bring joy to weddings where he felt his true calling, Ellen Albertson said.
It might have been rooted in a lifetime of devotion to his own wife, who made an immediate impression when they were introduced by a mutual friend in Stillwater. "She was smart, beautiful and tall and I thought, 'I better snatch her up fast!' " he said. And he did: They married six months later, in 1958.
He started performing weddings even before becoming a judge, she said. Soon after graduating from William Mitchell College of Law and passing the bar, he was appointed a court commissioner, a position that gave him some legal powers that included officiating at weddings.