Consolation for Plains: Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter are back together again

PLAINS, Ga. — As mourners here reflected on the loss of their southwest Georgia community’s most famous resident, they cited what he cherished: decency, human rights, his hometown and former first lady Rosalynn Carter.

Born in Plains, the Carters grew up 3 miles apart, stayed married for 77 years and lived in the same house here for decades. Rosalynn died last year. A fierce advocate for mental health, she was 96 and had been battling dementia. Though they grieve the former president’s passing, friends emphasized a sweet consolation: Jimmy and Rosalynn are reunited.

“He wanted to be with Rosalynn, so today is the day that he got his wish,” Jill Stuckey, a longtime Carter family friend and the superintendent of the Jimmy Carter National Historic Park, said Sunday as the news of his death was still fresh. “Others of us selfishly wish he could have been on this Earth with us.”

Carter, the only Georgian ever elected to the White House, entered home hospice care in Plains in February 2023 after a series of short hospital stays. He died Sunday after turning 100 in October.

On Monday, Mary Mancus fastened a white ribbon on the front door of Buffalo Café in the former president’s honor. Mancus, who greets thousands of visitors to Plains every year as the downtown restaurant’s manager, champions the Nobel Peace Prize recipient’s philanthropy and charitable work.

“I don’t care what you thought of his presidency, he was the best ex-president we’ve ever had, and we should respect what he did,” she said.

Mancus moved to Plains when she was 18 and brought food to the Carters over the years. The former president’s favorite, she said, was chicken salad and pimento cheese.

Since Sunday night, Mancus has been busy preparing more sweet tea and vegetable soup for the many mourners expected in Plains this week and next.

“As townspeople, our job is to relieve the pressure on the family,” she said. “We provide what we can in support and leave them alone so we can let them grieve in peace.”

Carter’s funeral procession is expected to travel to Atlanta by motorcade on Saturday, according to plans, which could still shift slightly. The former president’s remains are then expected to be flown to Washington D.C. on Monday, before returning Jan. 9 to Plains, where he will be buried next to Rosalynn.

Andrew Greer visited the historic train depot here after learning of Carter’s death. As he stood Sunday night on the platform of what served as Carter’s 1976 presidential campaign headquarters, Greer remembered him as a humanitarian and champion of democracy.

“You think about losing a pillar of the community in Plains,” said Greer, a Carter family friend who cowrote a song celebrating the former president’s 100th birthday. “On an international scale, you think about losing a pillar of peace. That is what I kept thinking today.”

Across the street, Philip Kurland has sold political campaign memorabilia out of his Plains Trading Post for more than 30 years. Most of what he sells are campaign buttons. All original, dating back to Abraham Lincoln. On Monday, Kurland stood in the middle of his shop, wearing a gray sweater with a big new button attached: “In Memoriam – Jimmy Carter.” Kurland said he ordered about 50 only a week ago.

“I had no reason to make it other than intuition told me it was time,” Kurland said.

Plains, a rural town about a three-hour drive south of Atlanta, has fewer than 1,000 residents.

In his 2001 memoir “An Hour Before Daylight: Memories of a Rural Boyhood,” Carter remembered selling boiled peanuts in Plains when he was 5 years old.

“Few people knew more about the Plains community than I did,” Carter wrote. “I became something of a fixture on the streets and in the business establishments, and the adults acted as though I didn’t exist.”

Jimmy and Rosalynn taught Sunday school at Maranatha Baptist Church, a small house of worship located just outside of Plains. The former president mowed the grass there and crafted a wooden cross that stands in the sanctuary.

“It is difficult for me to explain why the town of Plains is so attractive to Rosalynn and me,” he wrote in his memoir. “Plains is where I’ve seen the members of my family laid to rest, and where we expect to be buried.”

A prayer vigil was planned for Monday evening at Maranatha, said Jan Williams, a longtime Plains resident who serves as the church’s clerk and pianist.

“My husband and I have been receiving so many text messages from people who came to Maranatha to hear him teach and who wanted to share what an honor it was to be in his presence and what an effect it has had on their lives,” she said.

“I know that is what Jimmy Carter wanted — to have an effect on everybody he met so they could be a better person in the coming days. He always said, ‘If you can love the person in front of you, it would be a much better world.’”

Tiffani Lowden has a clear memory of the day she met Carter in 2018 during one of his Sunday School services here. A schoolteacher, Lowden was inspired by how Carter “walked a life of Christ.” She brought students to Plains to teach them there is goodness in everyone and that they can achieve their goals regardless of where they come from.

On Monday morning, Lowden strolled through Carter’s boyhood farm, referring to him as “Uncle Jimmy.” It felt holy for her to stand near where Carter will eventually be buried in Plains.

“He’s home,” she said. “He’s where he wanted to be.”

The Carters graduated from Plains High School, which is now part of the Jimmy Carter National Historic Park. It displays some of their mementos as well as a large black and white photograph of them riding a tandem bicycle.

At the former first lady’s funeral in Atlanta last year, Amy Carter read from a letter her father sent her mother more than 75 years ago while he was serving with the U.S. Navy.

“My darling, every time I have ever been away from you, I have been thrilled when I returned to discover just how wonderful you are. While I am away, I try to convince myself that you really are not, could not be, as sweet and beautiful as I remember,” Amy Carter recited.

“But when I see you, I fall in love with you all over again. Does that seem strange to you? It doesn’t to me. Goodbye, darling. Until tomorrow, Jimmy.”

Stuckey, the historic park’s superintendent, was visiting her mother in Ohio Sunday when she learned the former president had died. As she drove back to Georgia, she called the news bittersweet, underscoring that the Carters would be back together again.

“I’ve been fortunate enough for nearly 30 years,” Stuckey said, “to be with my heroes.”