A day in the life of America's plainspoken man of peace
Mon Oct 14, 8:00 AM ET

Gregg Zoroya USA TODAY

PLAINS, Ga. -- Jimmy Carter will suddenly appear without fanfare or entourage in this tiny hamlet that has been his life's wellspring. It might be at Mom's Kitchen for lunch, or in a hallway of Maranatha Baptist Church before Sunday school, or pedaling up Main Street on his burgundy Rivendell bicycle.

And the newly anointed Nobel Peace Prize laureate insists the award won't change that. ''After this big crowd leaves, I'll be riding back downtown on my bicycle,'' he told reporters during a Friday press conference in Plains.

''It didn't change my life when I became a state senator, or governor, or president or a defeated candidate for re-election, and I don't think this will change my life, either. My roots are too deep here to be changed, and I'm too old.''

Carter's shoulders are a little stooped now, and the head of hair is nearly bone-white. But there is that toothy grin and perhaps a '70s affectation -- ''Hey, man'' -- as Carter greets admirers, tourists or those who simply want to shake hands with a bit of living history.

The award should go a long way toward easing Carter's stigma of being a one-term president involuntarily retired by a landslide defeat to Ronald Reagan (news - web sites) in 1980, says historian Douglas Brinkley, a Carter biographer.

''He doesn't seem like a loser anymore,'' Brinkley says. ''He's a winner.''

Geoffrey Kemp, a former national security aide to Ronald Reagan, said the honor was a way of citing Carter's work in ''being the world's most visible fireman.''

The nation's 39th president, who just turned 78, has emerged as the most accessible of America's five former presidents. For people seeking to press historical flesh, catching other members of this unique fraternity is a game of luck. Spotting Gerald Ford dining on the balcony at Pepi's Restaurant in Vail, Colo., is one good bet. The elder George Bush is a denizen of the Texas A&M Aggies' Kyle Field on big game days in College Station. It's possible to run into Bill Clinton walking his chocolate Labrador, Seamus, in the small downtown of Chappaqua, N.Y. And until the onset of Alzheimer's, Ronald Reagan could be seen every Sunday sitting in same pew at Bel Air Presbyterian Church in Los Angeles.

But in Plains, you can hear Jimmy, you can meet Jimmy, you can pose for a picture with Jimmy.

''He likes touching people and people touch him,'' Brinkley says.

Carter is his own living monument here amid all the National Park-operated Jimmy Carter sites, and the former president concedes he is now a tourist attraction in Plains.

''I know that's the case,'' he says, then adds later with that famous smile: ''People who despised me and voted twice for Ronald Reagan probably wouldn't come to Plains and spend the night.''

Here in Plains, tourism is modest but growing for a man whose popularity ebbed low during his presidency. Visitation has grown to 60,000 since the entire town was declared an historic site in December 1987, an increase of 161%. The number of folks traveling to this out-of-the-way town 2 hours south of Atlanta was up 15% last year, compared with a 2% decline at all other National Parks. For fans of history, Plains has a rare mix.

''You get the historic site and the man himself. It doesn't get any better,'' says Dwight Pitcaithley, National Park chief historian. ''It would be like going back to Springfield (Ill.) and finding Abraham Lincoln on the front porch.''

Plains, with a population of more than 600, is a Jimmy Carter mecca. His boyhood home, the high school he and Rosalynn attended and the train depot that was his 1976 campaign headquarters are National Park museums. The gated, if modest, residence the Carters have shared here since 1961 is park property. Carter is the first ex-president to live at his federal historic site since Lyndon Johnson.

''We love coming down and enjoying the president,'' says Army Capt. Bill Keltner, 41, of Stockbridge, Ga., in town with his wife and daughter. They visit Plains every September for the Peanut Festival, a celebration of the famous Carter crop. The former president is always in attendance, handing out awards for a road race and playing softball. ''He walks around and shakes everybody's hand. I think it's great.''

Carter -- who will walk the length of a commercial jet to greet people, and write his name at a book signing until a line of 1,200 is exhausted and his shoulder aches -- gives several reasons for his accessibility. There is a desire to promote his books and tourism in his hometown, the simple notion of filling seats at the church where he teaches Sunday school to fill the collection plate, and his willingness to placate those who seek to meet him. But there is something else less tangible in it for him.

''I do (get) a sense of friendship and gratification. People come here because they think about me,'' Carter says, standing in what was his Uncle Alton Carter's mercantile business on Main Street here, now renovated into a bed and breakfast operated by the town's redevelopment organization. Rosalynn Carter helped plan the décor.

''He just enjoys seeing the people,'' says the 75-year-old former first lady. She does, too, she adds, though unlike Jimmy, her patience runs thin with people eager to take her picture. ''I tolerate photographs.''

Carter's penchant for suddenly showing up in a room or setting without notice was common even when he was in the White House. Then, some say, it seemed oddly out of place for the leader of the free world. Here, the apparitions are a charming surprise. Heads turn. Faces light up. Adults stoop to whisper his name and point him out to young children.

''I think everybody just feels a need to be connected to somebody who ran our country,'' says Mike Hayes, 44, a firefighter from Mishawaka, Ind., who stood in line as Carter signed books at the recent Peanut Festival.

His wife, Mary, 41, in her haste, botched a digital photo of the former president with Mike at the signing. ''I got the floor.''

Not to worry. A second photo session with Carter after church the next morning produced their keepsake. ''I cannot believe we just met him,'' Mary Hayes says.

The Maranatha church Web site has Carter's Sunday school teaching schedule. The class is held in the chapel. Carter gives his lesson standing at the front of the assemblage, not from the pulpit. The lessons are sprinkled with observations and anecdotes that just a select few in the world could cite with authority. And the place is usually packed with 200 to 300 people, only a few dozen of whom are actually church members. On a recent Sunday, there were folks from as far away as Oregon.

And the payoff for those who stay through pastor Dan Ariail's church sermon is that the former first couple will greet and have their photo taken with anyone who wants to wait in line out on the lawn after church.

Eagerly queued up one Sunday are two Republicans who were boys when Carter served as Democratic president from 1977 to 1981. Mike Condon, 34, a newspaper editor from Budd Lake, N.J., and fellow political buff Jeff Ceterko, 31, of Westfield, N.J., have made a hobby out of getting snapshots of every former living president and tick off each one of them as troublesome to approach.

But Carter elicits rave reviews this morning. ''There's no one even close to him,'' gushes Condon.

As the successes and travails of Carter's one-term presidency -- the Camp David peace accords, double-digit inflation and a 444-day Iran hostage crisis -- recede further into history, the growing number of visitors to Plains seems a broad mix.

''There's a natural presumption when they come here that they looked with favor on what I did as a president,'' he says. And that is certainly true of some who are here as die-hard political supporters.

But there are also fans of his 16 books, among them the critically acclaimed An Hour Before Daylight, an autobiographical primer on growing up in Depression-era Plains that topped The New York Times best-seller list for 15 weeks last year and made the USA TODAY Best-Selling Books list for 28 weeks. Carter hopes to have a 17th book, a historical novel set in the American Revolution, in bookstores in time for Christmas 2003.

A good many tourists are smitten with Carter's hyperactive post-presidency that won him the Peace Prize last week: his long association with the affordable housing efforts of Habitat for Humanity and his chairmanship of the Carter Center, dedicated to fighting disease in Third World countries, negotiating international peace agreements and monitoring overseas elections.

''Jimmy's always trying to do good,'' says Larry Grier, 48, of Atlanta, a food services manager, who sought a signature during the Peanut Festival. ''He has a good heart. He's a good person.''

In fact, Carter's popularity as an ex-president has never been higher. For a leader who endured some of the lowest approval ratings of any post-war president, polling in recent years has shown two-thirds of Americans looking with favor on the man. He also remains outspoken on issues, visiting Cuba in May and castigating Castro repression in a televised speech, and criticizing the Bush administration for contemplating a unilateral attack on Iraq. Carter said such a military action, with United Nations (news - web sites) support, would be a ''tragic mistake for this country.''

An anonymous Bush administration official complained in the media recently that Carter has ''been popping off for decades.'' And some critics such as commentator Robert Novak are unimpressed. On Sunday talk shows after the Nobel win, Novak said the committee ''slipped up'' by honoring a man who ''screws up everything he touches.''

But the former president simply shrugs off censure. He's still a player.

''I could have gone into seclusion basically and lived like Harry Truman, which would have been attractive, just devoting my life to a library,'' Carter says. ''But I've chosen to be a professor (at Emory University) and Carter Center work, which injects me into current affairs. And I don't feel any constraints about being silent.''

His is a fast-paced existence, even as 80 approaches.

''We have a good life. It's always exciting and never boring,'' says Rosalynn.

Her husband's health is excellent, according to a full medical workup just completed. His brother, two sisters and father all died of pancreatic cancer, and his famous mother, Lillian, of breast cancer (news - web sites) that spread to her pancreas. But Jimmy was the one who didn't smoke and so far he's been free of the deadly disease. He and Rosalynn work out regularly with cycling, hiking and exercise machines in the Secret Service (news - web sites)'s gym. Rosalynn cooks him low-fat, low-carbohydrate , low-salt meals. Lots of soups.

''She's fascinated with nutrition,'' he says.

His day begins at 5 a.m. After reading e-mails and three major newspapers, he will work on his novel in the garage that he long ago turned into a study. Like all ex-presidents, he keeps phone privileges at the White House switchboard for making international phone calls. And when he feels like it, Carter steps out to his woodworking shop to design and build furniture.

It's a full life. And letting the public into it is just another item on the agenda.

''I doubt any other president has been as accessible as I am,'' Carter says. ''I don't try to compete with them. This is an accessible neighborhood. How could you avoid it unless you hide yourself?''

For Tom Brown, 61, a retired electronics engineer from Palm Bay, Fla., who stood in line at Maranatha church, meeting a one-time commander in chief, a guy who once had his finger on the button, was a truly patriotic experience. Brown still had a little buzz going minutes after the encounter.

''I think it's fabulous. All-American,'' says the retiree, who has worn a large flag pin on his shirt every day since that infamous Sept. 11. ''Perfect for me. I love it.''

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