{"id":10356,"date":"2023-04-04T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2023-04-04T11:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=10356"},"modified":"2023-05-10T08:04:51","modified_gmt":"2023-05-10T12:04:51","slug":"bloom-where-youre-planted-us-presidents-in-rural-georgia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=10356","title":{"rendered":"\u201cBloom Where You\u2019re Planted\u201d: US Presidents in Rural Georgia"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Our swing through the southeast included visits to sites associated with two U.S. Presidents\u2014Jimmy Carter and Franklin Roosevelt. It\u2019s refreshing to think about Presidents of the past, on this day especially when a former president will be arraigned on criminal charges. They may have had flaws, but their vision and strength of character brought the country through dark times. Both men valued contact with \u201cordinary Americans\u201d in rural Georgia and never lost their sincere interest in and connection to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We spent a night at the Plains (Georgia) Historic Inn<\/a>, in Plains, Georgia<\/strong>, which Jimmy and Rosalynn helped refurbish and which was loaded with charm. Each of the seven rooms is decorated in the style of a decade from the 1920s to the 1980s. (It would be a perfect place for a mystery story. The old building\u2019s squeaky floors provide a challenge to anyone trying to sneak up on a victim, and the building\u2019s former use as a funeral home\u2014complete with a special, still-working elevator to move caskets between floors\u2014imparts the right ghostly vibe.) Ellen, the innkeeper, was most welcoming, had breakfast options available, and went above-and-beyond by returning the raincoat I left in the closet. The rooms contained presidential-related memorabilia and some have views of Plains\u2019s Main Street, possibly three blocks long.<\/p>\n\n\n

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The Jimmy Carter National Historical Park includes the visitor\u2019s center, housed in the Carters\u2019 high school (pictured), with numerous displays of their lives and times, plus an excellent video. The Plains Depot museum commemorates its role as Carter\u2019s 1976 Presidential campaign headquarters. The boyhood farm, two and a half miles outside town, showed what life was like in 1938, when Carter was 14. Lots of work, starting before dawn and lasting until suppertime. It prepared Jimmy to be hands-on with his aid to Habitat for Humanity<\/a>. He knows through experience which end of a tool is the working end.<\/p>\n\n\n

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When Carter was a teenager, his uncle in the Navy wrote him letters about his experiences, inspiring Jimmy to attend the Naval Academy<\/a>. When he first applied, his would-be Senate sponsor said his high school was too small, he\u2019d never make it. So Carter went to Georgia Southwestern College in Americus for a year, excelled, and tried again. Once more, the school was deemed too small, so he went to Georgia Institute of Technology for another year, and again he excelled. More senatorial foot-draggin. After church one Sunday, Carter and his father visited the Senator, unannounced, and talked to him until late that night. Finally, the Senator said, \u201cIf you\u2019ll just go home, I\u2019ll put his name in for the next Annapolis opening.\u201d A good lesson in persistence! The news that he has entered hospice care has prompted a lot of reexamination of his career, including how, as a Navy lieutenant, he saved a Canadian nuclear reactor<\/a> from a catastrophic meltdown.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Warm Springs, Georgia<\/strong>, was a favorite retreat for President Franklin D. Roosevelt, as the 88-degree spring-fed pools there (now empty and in need of renovation; model pictured–sorry about the reflections!) allowed him some relief from the debilitating effects of polio. In 1927, he founded Roosevelt Warm Springs<\/a> rehabilitation center to treat polio patients; it continues today as a comprehensive rehabilitation center for people with disabilities. The photographs of him playing with the kids in the water show his love of life, children, and his indomitable spirit.<\/p>\n\n\n

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We also toured the FDR State Historic Site<\/a> visitors\u2019 center and Little White House. The visitors’ center museum houses a variety of memorabilia, including FDR’s 1938 Ford convertible retrofitted with hand controls, and a large display of canes sent him by supporters. The Warm Springs retreat gave FDR a chance to visit with neighbors in the area\u2019s rural communities and learn about their problems, which inspired some elements of the New Deal. When we were there, in recognition of the concept of service to the country, the museum included an exhibit about military chaplaincy, including commemoration of \u201cThe Four Chaplains.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Little White House <\/a>was built in 1932 to make his recuperative stays more feasible, given the demands of the governorship of New York, soon to be superseded by those of the Presidency. The house still displays the chair where he died April 12, 1945, mere weeks before the end of the War in Europe, which he\u2019d worked so hard to bring the country through successfully. That afternoon, he was posing for a portrait by Madame Elizabeth Shoumatoff, and the \u201cUnfinished Portrait\u201d is a highlight of the museum.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also in this Georgia-Alabama travel tips series:<\/em>
Brushes with Literary Fame<\/a> (Lee, Capote, O\u2019Connor, and more)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Our swing through the southeast included visits to sites associated with two U.S. Presidents\u2014Jimmy Carter and Franklin Roosevelt. It\u2019s refreshing to think about Presidents of the past, on this day especially when a former president will be arraigned on criminal … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Two Presidents whose connections to the people of the rural Southeast shaped their administrations--Jimmy Carter and Franklin Roosevelt.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[266,268,35,104,78],"tags":[2073,2071,2072,2075],"class_list":["post-10356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-politics","category-real-life","category-the-morgue","category-travel","tag-franklin-d-roosevelt","tag-jimmy-carter","tag-plains-georgia","tag-warm-springs-georgia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2H2","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10356"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10356\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10363,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10356\/revisions\/10363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}