Yes, he was a former president of the United States — but he was also a down-to-earth grandpa
Former President Jimmy Carter was laid to rest in Plains, Georgia, on Thursday, after a state funeral held in the Washington National Cathedral. The funeral was attended by all five living former presidents and other dignitaries.
But part of what is so endearing about Jimmy Carter is that he was also a regular grandpa, as described by his grandson, Jason.
“Yes, they spent four years in the governor’s mansion and four years at the White House,” he said, “but the other 92 years,”he emphasized as the audience chuckled, “they spent at home in Plains, Georgia.”
ason described his grandparents home: “First of all, it looks like they might have built it themselves” he said — which in fact, they did, back in 1960 and 1961. They added onto it twice, in 1974 and 1981. The 4,000 square-foot home is worth about $250,000, according to Zillow.
Next, Jason described what it was like to walk into the modest house. “My grandfather was likely to show up at the door in some ‘70s short shorts and crocs,” he said. “And then you’d walk in the house and it was like thousands of other grandparents’ houses all across the South. Fishing trophies on the walls. The refrigerator, of course, was papered with pictures of grandchildren and then great-grandchildren.”
Like many grandparents — or great-grandparents, really — they saw no real need to move on from what was already working. “Their main phone, of course, had a cord and was stuck to the wall in the kitchen. Like a museum piece,” Jason explained, adding that they demonstrated their Depression-era roots by having “a little rack next to the sink where they would hang Ziploc bags to dry.”
Eventually, the former president did get a cell phone — but it was kind of confusing. Jason remembers, ”One time he called me sort of early on in that process. And on my phone it said ‘Papa mobile.’ So I answered it, of course. I said, ‘Hey, Papa.’ He said, ‘Who’s this?!’ I said, ‘This is Jason.’ He said, ‘What are you doing?’ I said, ‘I’m not doing anything — you called me.’ He said, ‘I didn’t call you. I’m taking a picture.’ Nuclear engineer, right?” Jason joked.
They were small-town people who never forgot who they were and where they were from, no matter what happened in their lives. Jason Carter told Rolling Stone in 2011 that they had done everything they could to stay normal people. They were super excited — legitimately excited! — when the Dollar General store opened in Plains. “They buy their clothes there,” he said.
Jason Carter also talked of his grandpa’s fight against the guinea worm, explaining that “it’s an ancient and debilitating disease of poverty, and that disease will have existed from the dawn of humanity — until Jimmy Carter.” When he started working on this disease, there were 3.5 million cases in humans every year. Last year there were 14.
“The thing that’s remarkable is that this disease is not eliminated with medicine,” said Jason. “It’s eliminated essentially by neighbors talking to neighbors about how to collect water in the poorest and most marginalized villages in the world.”
Like many grandpas, Jimmy Carter loved people. Every day, he lived the commandment to “love your neighbor,” said his grandson, no matter where they lived in the world, what they had in the way of worldly possessions, their gender or their race.
Reverend Andrew Young, a Black, prominent civil rights leader and former United Nations ambassador who served under Carter, began his eulogy at Carter’s funeral Thursday with a simple declaration: “Jimmy Carter, for me, was something of a miracle.”
Jimmy was buried in his backyard in Plains, Georgia, under a willow tree, next to his beloved Rosalynn.
Originally published in the Deseret News
