A love for the ages. Former President Jimmy Carter and his wife Rosalynn Carter’s relationship is the longest presidential marriage in U.S. history.
Long before Jimmy became the 39th President of the United States, he met his future wife when he was 3 years old, as his mother, Lillian Carter, helped deliver Rosalynn in 1927. The two have been side-by-side ever since, tying the knot in 1946 and welcoming four children together. The pair have been through it all, from living in their hometown of Plains, Georgia to Jimmy’s presidency and every in between — and after.
Days before their 75th wedding anniversary in July 2021, Jimmy called his marriage to Rosalynn the “most important thing in my life” during an interview with Good Morning America, going on to add that her “staying with me all this long has been the most wonderful thing in my life.”
As for how they’ve maintained their romance all of these years, he told GMA, “We’ve survived this long together because first of all, we give each other plenty of space to do our own thing.” Still, the politician added, they also like to “share as much as we possibly can.”
“We’re always looking to do things or find things we can do together,” Rosalynn went on to note, revealing that the longtime couple enjoy “fishing and bird watching and just going out to the pond, catch a fish.”
Jimmy concluded the interview by revealing that their love for each other has only increased over time. “For 75 years of marriage, we’ve always gone deeper in our love for one another,” he stated. “I think that’s a kind of extraordinary thing. Doesn’t happen to very many couples, but it certainly happened to us.”
Among their many projects over the years — including authoring several books together and founding the not-for-profit organization The Carter Center — one of the charities closest to the couple’s heart is Habitat for Humanity, which they began working with in 1984. Their work with the foundation sparked the creation of The Carter Work Project, an annual weeklong building event.
Throughout their marriage, Jimmy —who is the longest-living president in history — has experienced several health scares, including a 2019 fall in his house that left him with forehead stitches, and most notably, his 2015 cancer diagnosis.
Despite feeling despair about the diagnosis — which later cleared in December 2015 — Jimmy revealed at the time that it made him appreciate his achievements even more. “I felt that I was thankful, because I’ve had a remarkably successful life,” he said while working at a Habitat for Humanity project in August 2016. “You know, I was the most powerful person in the world when I was president of the United States, and I’ve had a wonderful family and everything has been going well.”
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Scroll below to relive Jimmy and Rosalynn’s decades-long relationship: