Street In Plains, Georgia, Renamed In Honor Of Rosalynn Carter

PLAINS, GA — The city of Plains, Georgia, has consistently come in under 1,000 residents when the U.S. census updates every 10 years. The town only has a few streets and can only be reached by following a series of back roads, as the closest interstate exit lies more than 40 miles away in Cordele.

Among the only hundreds who have called Plains home over the decades are Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter, the former first lady and president of the United States.

The Carters’ name is all over town, from the Jimmy Carter National Historic Park and famous Carter “Peanut of Plains” statue to the Billy Carter Service Station at the center of town in memory of the former president’s late brother and the Lillian Carter Health and Rehabilitation nursing home in memory of the 39th president’s late mother.

Now, residents of the southwestern Georgia city with only one major intersection can add Rosalynn Carter Trail to the list of their forever ties to the Carter family. The city has renamed a stretch of Bond Street, where Rosalynn Carter grew up, in honor of the former first lady, who was in the White House from 1977-1981.

Current residents on Bond Street decided on the renaming before Rosalynn Carter even knew about it, WMAZ reported. They said if she found out, she probably would tell them not to do it.

The honor came this past weekend, just a couple of days before Rosalynn Carter’s 94th birthday.

In true form, for both the former first lady and her 95-year-old husband, Rosalynn Carter volunteered for a food drive with Second Harvest, Maranatha Baptist Church, later in the day after speaking at the street renaming ceremony, according to WSBT.

The Rosalynn Carter Butterfly Trail Children's Garden was also introduced in the town that day.

"She always loved flowers and loved butterflies, Aunt Rosalynn, and she's interested in the pollination and the preservation of the Monarch butterfly and all, and she grew up with my grandmother who loved flowers," LeAnne Smith, Rosalynn Carter’s niece, told WMAZ.

Jimmy Carter’s dedication to Habitat for Humanity and building houses dates back decades, and his on-the-ground volunteerism for the group — even into his 90s — has been well documented.