- NAME – James Earl Carter, Jr.
Library of Congress - NICKNAME(S) – Jimmy
- BIRTH / DEATH – Oct. 1, 1924 Plains, Ga.
- FATHER – peanut farmer and local store / state legislator
- MOTHER – nurse
- COLLEGE – Georgia Southwestern College / Georgia Institute of Technology / Naval Academy
- WIFE – Rosalyn Smith
- KIDS – 4 (3 kids)
- RELIGION – Baptist
- ANCESTRY –
- AGE – 52
FIRSTS:
– first born in a hospital
– first to attend the Naval Academy
– first to use a nickname as President
– first to host a Pope at the White House (John Paul II)
MA AND PA: Jimmy was one of the few Presidents whose upbringing was influenced more by his father than his mother. James, Sr. only made it through tenth grade. He moved to Texas to become a cowboy for a couple of years to earn enough money to start a business back home in Plains, Georgia. He opened an ice house and then a laundry. He succeeded in each new business. In WWI, he was an officer in the Quartermaster Corps. He had a grocery store on Main Street, but he increasingly concentrated on his farm which grew peanuts efficiently. It eventually reached over 4,000 acres. He was in numerous civic organizations and always willing to help fellow farmers. He was elected to the Georgia legislature where he was very conservative. He died before he could complete his term due to pancreatic cancer. He met Bessie Lillian (called Lilly) Gordy when she was a student nurse. He insisted on her finishing her education before they married. Since she helped care for the poor, especially in child-birthing, she was away from home a lot. Her husband did most of the child-rearing, with the help of black nannies. Jimmy was very close to his father. When he died, Lilly was overwhelmed with having to take over the peanut business. Their oldest son Jimmy resigned from a promising career in the Navy to return home and help her. She suffered from severe depression for a while after her husband’s death. She eventually snapped out of it by taking on new challenges. She became a house mother for a fraternity at Auburn University for seven years. In her late 60’s she saw an ad for the Peace Corps and joined. She went to India for two years and loved it. When Jimmy ran for President, she was a valuable asset. She gave hundreds of speeches for him. She lived to age 85. Parents
BACKGROUND:
– worked at father’s store growing up; also picked cotton and peanuts
– graduated from the Naval Academy
– served on nuclear subs in the Navy
– 1953 – after father’s death left the Navy to run the peanut farm
– involved in local politics
– 1961 – elected to Georgia legislature
– 1966 – lost race for Governor of Georgia
– 1970 – elected Governor of Georgia
FIRST LADY: Rosalynn was a small town girl from Plains, Georgia. When her father died at age 16, she took a job in a beauty parlor to make ends meet. Her sister knew Jimmy and when he returned one time from Annapolis, she set them up. It was love at first sight for him. They were married two years later. She enjoyed life as the wife of a submariner and was upset when Jimmy had to resign and return to run the family peanut farm. She did not want to go back to small town life. Becoming bookkeeper for the farm gave her some purpose in life. It took her a while to warm to politics, but she became an asset. As First Lady, her projects included mental health issues and improving conditions for the elderly. She lobbied for the Equal Rights Amendment. As First Lady, she created controversy by sitting in on Cabinet meetings. She was definitely more influential than most First Ladies. Kelly 345-346
Library of Congress
TRIVIA:
– liked to listen to baseball on the radio when he was growing up
– was a good basketball player when growing up
– was in the top 10% of his class at the Naval Academy
– was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002
– was a speed-reader who could read 2,000 words a minute
– great-grandfather was in the Confederate Army
– was nicknamed “Hot” (short for “Hot Shot”) as a boy
– he was the class valedictorian in high school
– while serving on the USS Pomfret, he was thrown overboard by a wave, but another wave put him back on deck
– when he left the Navy to return to run the family farm, because of a drought, they made only $200 the first year, but he built it into a $800,000/year business
– he continued teaching Sunday school even when he was President
– he organized soft ball games between the press corps and the Secret Service plus his aides
– the Carter’s were very frugal. When Rosalyn saw how much money was being spent on food, she insisted on the kitchen staff buying the cheapest brands. One year, the food budget ended up at $1,372. This was way below the allowance of $50,000. Whitcomb and Whitcomb 99
– when Willie Nelson spent the night at the White House, an unidentified person (not Jimmy) took him up on the roof where he drank and beer and smoked a joint Whitcomb and Whitcomb 253
– to save money, he sold the Presidential yacht Sequoia for $236,000. It was costing $800,000 per year to operate.
– when he was born, his home had no electricity, no running water, and no indoor plumbing
– Plains, Georgia had a population of 650 when he was elected
– favorite dessert – peach ice cream
– when he was Governor of Georgia, he said he saw a UFO one night, but later he explained he did not mean it was an alien, just that it was unidentified
ANECDOTES:
LITTLE WHITE LIES – When Carter was running for President, he promised the public he would never lie to them. Before assuming the office, he had his staff compile a list of all the promises he made on the campaign trail. The list ended up to be 112 pages of promises. It became embarrassing when the press got a hold of the list and Carter was far from carrying out most of his promises in his four years. One day a reporter went to interview the President’s mother Lillian and the following conversation occurred:
Reporter: “Is it true your son never tells a lie?”
Lillian: “Well, now, what do you mean by a lie? Sometimes he may have told a white lie.”
Reporter: “What do you mean by a white lie?”
Lillian: “Remember when you came in and I said how glad I was to see you?” Whitcomb and Whitcomb 207-208
THE KILLER RABBIT ATTACK
Did you know an American President survived an assassination by a swamp rabbit? It happened on April 20, 1979. President Jimmy Carter was fishing in a flat-bottomed bottom alone while on vacation in Plains, Georgia. As he told a reporter later, a swamp rabbit swam out towards the boat “with strange hissing noises and gnashing its teeth”. Apparently fleeing from hounds, the rabbit wanted to get into the boat. Carter used his paddle to splash water at the desperate bunny. It worked as the potential assassin swam elsewhere. Carter’s staff found the story amusing and some were skeptical about a swimming rabbit, but a White House photographer had taken a picture that proved the President was not making it up. A while later, Carter told the story to a reporter and on August 30, the Washington Post ran a front page article entitled “Bunny Goes Bugs: Rabbit Attacks President.” Soon the rest of the media picked up the story and it became fodder for political cartoonists and stand-up comics. The lack of video was solved by running the clip of the killer rabbit scene from “Monty Python and the Holy Grail”. Carter became a laughing stock. After Reagan became President, the White House released the photo of the rabbit approaching the boat. So we know the story was true. What is unclear is why Carter would not keep such a story under his hat.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jimmy_Carter_rabbit_incident