Jimmy Carter entered hospice care in February 2023 at the age of 98 and had many speculating his final days were near.
But it would be nearly two years until the former U.S. president will be buried alongside his wife Rosalynn, who passed November 19, 2023.
The two entered end-of-life in-home hospice care together at their home in Plains, Georgia.
The former president eventually passed away at the age of 100 on Sunday, December 29 in his Georgia home, according to his son Chip, 74.
‘My father was a hero, not only to me but to everyone who believes in peace, human rights, and unselfish love,’ said Chip Carter, 74, upon announcing the passing of his beloved father.
‘My brothers, sister, and I shared him with the rest of the world through these common beliefs. The world is our family because of the way he brought people together, and we thank you for honoring his memory by continuing to live these shared beliefs.’
Jimmy and Rosalynn had four children – Jack, Chip, Jeff and Amy – and are survived by 25 grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
The Democrat served one term in the White House and dedicated the rest of his life to charity. He decided against more medical treatment in February 2023 and entered hospice after a string of hospital stays.
In his final years, the Nobel Peace Prize winner spent his days at his home alongside his beloved wife of 77 years until her passing at the age of 96.
He was surrounded by family in the weeks following his wife’s death.
Rosalynn passed following a dementia diagnosis. It shocked many when the former first lady passed before her husband following a series of health issues landing Carter in hospice care nine months before his wife joined him.
Carter, who was visibly sickly and completely bound to a wheelchair at the time, attended his wife’s funeral in Georgia in November 2023 along with other former first ladies and presidents.
President Joe Biden and first lady Jill Biden were longtime friends of the Carters and joined former President Bill Clinton and former first lady Hillary Clinton as well as former first ladies Melania Trump, Michelle Obama and Laura Bush in the front row for Rosalynn’s funeral.
Former Presidents Donald Trump, Barack Obama and George W. Bush did not attend the funeral in Plains, Georgia.
With Carter’s death, there are now only five living presidents.
Carter battled a few health issues over the years, but for a man in his 90s was relatively spry, continuing his work building homes with Habitat for Humanity well into his later years.
In August 2015, the former president was diagnosed with metastatic melanoma and had a small cancerous mass removed from his liver. It also spread to his brain. The following year, about six months after the diagnosis, Carter announced that he needed no further treatment, as an experimental drug had eliminated any sign of cancer.
Two years after a cancer diagnosis in 2015, Carter was hospitalized for dehydration while building homes in Canada.
He was back at the work site the next day.
A few years later, in 2019, when Carter was 95, he helped build a home in Nashville for Habitat for Humanity.
Only a handful of former presidents have lived past 90 years, including Ronald Reagan, Carter’s successor, who lived to be 93.
