Former President Jimmy Carter works at a Habitat for Humanity building site in Memphis, Tennessee in 2015. Photo / AP
Former President Jimmy Carter works at a Habitat for Humanity building site in Memphis, Tennessee in 2015. Photo / AP
Last month, at the age of 98, former American President Jimmy Carter was admitted to a hospice. He’ll probably be remembered as a peanut farmer from Georgia who never got the hang of being President, but what he should be remembered for is everything he did after that.
Like: hebuilt houses. In 1984, three years after leaving the White House, Carter picked up a hammer. Alongside his wife Rosalynn, he volunteered for Habitat for Humanity, a Christian charity that provides homes for people in need all over the world. It’s active in New Zealand.
Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter at work renovating a tenement on the East 6th Street in the East Village in Manhattan on September 4, 1984. The couple were working with Habitat for Humanity. Photo / Getty Images
They didn’t do it full-time, but they did do it with a high profile. A few years later in Milwaukee, the Carters were involved in a project where the weather was threatening to ruin the work done so far.
So Jimmy went on TV. “I appeal to roofing company heads to assist us in this worthwhile project,” he said. He asked them to bring scaffolding and their tools, and the next morning, 30 contractors showed up to work. The roofs went on in time.
Former politicians can make a difference. Jimmy and Rosalynn worked for Habitat for Humanity for 35 years, setting up the Carter Work Project to attract a small army of other volunteers and helping to build, renovate or repair nearly 4400 homes in 14 different countries.
They didn’t just show up for the cameras. They travelled to the worksites with a crew from their local church and they became a magnet for other supporters. That Milwaukee job attracted 240 volunteers over a week.
Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter in Baltimore 2010. Photo / Getty Images
“Everyone wants to build on Carter’s house,” the CEO of Habitat for Humanity, Jonathan Reckford, once said. “But it is both a great honour and a great responsibility. No one wants to get that steely submarine commander look when you’re not working hard enough.”
And Carter promoted the cause, helping to turn affordable housing and community investment into serious ideas that can make a difference. Housing, he always said, is a human right.
He hosted fundraising retreats, opened diplomatic doors in developing countries. One time, he greeted a group of Indian businessmen looking for a photo-op by handing them tools and putting them to work.
The Carters’ last building site was in Nashville in 2019, shortly after he had suffered a fall that left him with 14 stitches and a badly bruised eye. He turned up for work anyway, in denims and his trademark red bandanna. He was 95.
Jimmy Carter in Denver, 2013. Photo / Getty Images
In New Zealand, Habitat for Humanity is a CHP, pronounced “chip”, which stands for community housing providers. CHPs do their best to plug a large hole in the housing sector and have had much success. But, despite the public and private funding they receive, it’s an uphill battle, all the time, all the way.
Jimmy Carter at work in Charlotte, North Carolina in 1987. Photo / AP
It’s also rewarding. Carter once wrote, “Rosalynn and I have never had a more memorable and fulfilling experience ... The work was difficult, dirty, and sometimes even dangerous, but every moment was packed with a feeling of gratitude that we could be part of the project.”
And yes, Habitat in this country is always on the lookout for volunteers.
Design for Living appears weekly in Canvas magazine.
