Jimmy Carter’s Extended Public Farewell Began in Georgia
Jimmy Carter’s flag-draped casket left on Saturday in Atlanta, Georgia, as part of a six-day state funeral that will blend personalized memorials with ceremonial pomp afforded to former presidents. Carter, the 39th U.S. president, died on December 29 at the age of 100.
Carter’s son, James Earl “Chip” Carter III, said, “He was an amazing man. He was held up and propped up and soothed by an amazing woman,” referring to former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, who died in 2023. “The two of them together changed the world. And it was an amazing thing to watch so close.”
Grandson Jason Carter, who chairs the governing board of the Carter Presidential Center, said, “It’s amazing what you can cram into a hundred years.”
The hearse procession stopped at the farm where the future president toiled alongside Black sharecroppers who worked for his father. The motorcade continued to Atlanta, stopping in front of the Georgia Capitol where Carter served as a state senator and reformist governor. Finally, it arrived at the Carter Presidential Center, which houses his presidential library and The Carter Center.
Pallbearers came from the Secret Service that protected the Carters for almost a half-century and a military honor guard that included Navy servicemembers for the only U.S. Naval Academy graduate to reach the Oval Office. A military band played “Hail to the Chief” and the hymn “Be Thou My Vision” for the commander in chief who also was a devout Baptist.
Jimmy Carter’s children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren accompanied their patriarch as the hearse rode through his hometown of Plains, which at about 700 residents is not much bigger than when Carter was born there in 1924. The procession passed in front of the farm where Carter’s father owned the land and hired Black sharecroppers, who toiled alongside the future president.
The hearse then stopped at the Carter Presidential Center, where Carter will lie in repose from Saturday to Tuesday. The public can pay their respects around the clock. National rites will continue in Washington and conclude with a funeral at the Washington National Cathedral, followed by a return to Plains, where the former president will be buried next to his wife near the home they built before his first state Senate campaign in 1962.
Visitors to the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery gazed at a Norman Rockwell portrait of former US President Jimmy Carter in the Oval Office of the White House, draped in black mourning cloth.