Six days of events honoring former President Jimmy Carter began Saturday with a procession stopping in his hometown of Plains, Georgia, tributes at the state Capitol, and then a private service at the Carter Center in Atlanta, where his body will lie in repose until Tuesday.
Carter died on Dec. 29 at the age of 100. He served in the U.S. Navy for seven years before working on the family farm and running for office in Georgia, winning the governorship in 1970. Carter, a Democrat, was elected to the White House in 1976 and served a single term.
In his life post-presidency , Carter continued to pursue his passion for humanitarian work and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002 for his decades of efforts in advancing international peace, democracy and human rights.
“For us, in my family, we just knew him as a grandfather … and we’ve shared him with the country and the world in certain ways,” Jason Carter, his grandson and chair of the Carter Center’s board, told “CBS Mornings” on Friday. “I think people really connect with him because he was always just a regular guy.”