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'They're just like any other neighbor': Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter continue their legacy in Plains

After he left the White House, the former President went back to his small hometown of Plains in Sumter County.

PLAINS, Ga. — This Presidents' Day, we honor Georgia's president -- Jimmy Carter.

Unlike many presidents before and since, when he left the White House in 1981, Carter didn't go on a speaking tour or stay in Washington. 

He came back to Georgia to his hometown of Plains in Sumter County, where he and wife Rosalynn are beloved.

When you pull into Plains, it's like you haven't left the late 1970s. There are all kinds of things that remind you the 39th President is from here.

What you don't see is how President Carter wove himself into the fabric of this town long before he sat in the White House and long after he came home to Plains in 1981.

RELATED: After brain surgery, Jimmy Carter returns to hometown church

When Marilyn Cleveland and her husband moved to Plains, it was the Carters that brought gift bags and popped in just to say hello.

"And the voice said we wondered if you were going to be home this afternoon, and we said, 'Oh my gosh, we're just crazy little Vermonters; what do we deserve this for,'"  she recalled.

Cleveland volunteers at the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site, which is where he attended school as a child and graduated as a teenager.

"It makes volunteering here easier, and to think that I'm reaching out to other people and sharing the kindness that the Carters have and the peace they bring, and we just try to spread it further," she said.

Jill Stuckey, who runs the historic site, is good friends with the Carters.

"In this community they're just like any other neighbor, but when that neighbor comes to their house, there's Secret Service with them," Stuckey said.

When her husband passed away, the Carters provided comfort.

"He gave the eulogy at my husband's funeral and was at my house," she said. "Yeah, the Carters are one of us here in Plains, and they show up at peoples' houses just like my next door neighbor would."

Fast forward 70 years and Stuckey says the Carters are still making a difference around the world.

"Yes, Habitat for Humanity is a great example," Stuckey said. "And I tell people that Habitat is one week out of the year, what are they doing the rest of the year? They are working with the Carter Center, they're eradicating diseases, they're trying to promote free and fair elections."

RELATED: Former President Jimmy Carter is back teaching Sunday school

All big projects, but Jimmy doesn't lose sight of his hometown and the welfare of the folks who call Plains home.

"They're always going to be a part of this community," Stuckey said.

In March 2019, Carter became the oldest living former president in the nation's history.

When Carter passed 94 years and 172 days old, he officially lived longer than George H.W. Bush.

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