Being elected president of the United States just once would satisfy most people, but Jimmy Carter has pushed the envelope ever since he was a farm boy dreaming of the Navy. Our AJC colleague Jim Denery drew up this incomplete list of some of Carter’s biggest accomplishments, arranged as well as possible in chronological order:
1. As a lieutenant in the Navy in 1952, Carter served under the legendary Adm. Hyman Rickover, helping to develop a nuclear-powered Navy. Bringing things full circle, Carter in 2004 christened the USS Jimmy Carter, a $3.3 billion nuclear submarine.
2. Carter left the Navy in 1953, following the death of his father, Earl, who died of pancreatic cancer at the age of 58. The elder Carter was a member of the Georgia House of Representatives, and his son eventually followed him into politics. In 1962, after first winning a court fight over voter fraud, Jimmy Carter was elected to the Georgia Senate. In 1971, on his second try, Carter became Georgia’s governor, and in 1976, he won election to become the 39th president of the United States.
3. As president in 1978, Carter mediated negotiations between Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat to produce the Camp David Accords. Under the agreement, Israel agreed to return Egyptian territory conquered during the 1973 war, and Egypt in return extended full diplomatic recognition to Israel. Begin and Sadat won the Nobel Peace Prize for that effort.
