A Remarkable Mother
by Jimmy Carter
Summary
A Remarkable Mother is President Carter’s loving, admiring, wry homage to Miss Lillian Carter, who championed the underdog always, even when her son was president.
A registered nurse, pecan grower, university housemother, Peace Corps volunteer, public speaker, and renowned raconteur, Miss Lillian ignored the mores and prejudices of the racially segregated South of the Great Depression years. She was an avid supporter of the Brooklyn Dodgers (because she happened to attend the first major league baseball game in which Jackie Robinson, from Cairo, Georgia, played), was a favored guest on television talk shows (usually able to “steal the microphone” from hosts such as Johnny Carson and Walter Cronkite), and an important role model for the nation.
Jimmy Carter’s mother emerges from this portrait as redoubtable, generous, and forward-looking. He ascribes to her the inspiration for his own life’s work of commitment and faith.
Excerpt
Early Family Years
Bessie Lillian Gordy was born in Chattahoochee County, Georgia, the fifteenth day of August, 1898, and was one of the most extraordinary people I’ve ever known. She was the fourth of nine children, two of them adopted “double first cousins,” and was described in news reports as “third cousin of U.S. Senators Jesse Helms and Sam Nunn, fourth cousin of Elvis Presley, and mother of President Jimmy Carter.” We children thought this diverse heritage partially explained her interest in politics and showmanship, but not some of her other idiosyncrasies.
My mother’s great-grandfather Wilson Gordy was the first of his family to be born in Georgia, in 1801. He was descended from Peter Gordy, who was born in Somerset County, Maryland, in 1710. We’ve never attempted to trace the genealogy further, but some of the older kinfolks always said that the Gordys came from France. Wilson moved to West Georgia near the Chattahoochee River in the 1830s, soon after the Lower Creek Indians were forced westward and land was opened to white settlers. All of his possessions were in a large hogshead, with an axle through the center, which rolled down the narrow openings through virgin timber, drawn by his only horse. He soon became known as the best carpenter of what would be Chattahoochee County. Lillian’s grandfather James Thomas Gordy was a wagon master during the Civil War and later county tax collector, and he married Harriet Emily Helms, whose parents came from North Carolina.
Lillian’s father was James Jackson Gordy, named after an early hero of Revolutionary War days, and he was always known as Jim Jack. A federal government revenue officer in Southwest Georgia and later postmaster in Richland, he became one of the most astute political analysts in his changing communities.
Mama’s mother was Mary Ida Nicholson, daughter of Nathaniel Nunn Nicholson and granddaughter of Frances Nunn, whose family moved from the Carolinas to Georgia soon after the Revolutionary War.
My grandfather Jim Jack was thirteen years old when the “Northern oppressors” finally relinquished political and economic control of the state in 1876, and it was inevitable that there was still a legacy of North-South bitterness among the older relatives in the earliest political discussions I ever heard. Slavery was never mentioned—only the unwarranted violation of states’ rights and the intrusion of the federal government in the private lives of citizens. I remember that my mother was the only one in her family who ever spoke up to defend Abraham Lincoln.
Copyright © by Jimmy Carter. Reprinted by permission of Simon and Schuster Inc.
Reviews
”Former president Carter offers readers the story of his extraordinary mother….wonderful stories about a great woman”—Publishers Weekly
Author's Biography
Jimmy Carter was born in Plains, Georgia, and served as thirty-ninth President of the United States. He and his wife, Rosalynn, founded The Carter Center, a nonprofit organization that prevents and resolves conflicts, enhances freedom and democracy, and improves health around the world. He is the author of numerous books, including Palestine Peace Not Apartheid, An Hour Before Daylight and Our Endangered Values. He received a “Best Spoken Word” Grammy Award for his recording of Our Endangered Values. All of President Carter’s proceeds from this series will go to the Maranatha Baptist Church of Plains, Georgia.