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Jimmy Carter: Who are his children?

Jimmy Carter and his family
Jimmy Carter and his family FILE PHOTO: Jimmy Carter and Rosalynn Carter kissing, surrounded by family including Amy Carter and Lillian Carter, at Democratic National Convention, New York City, New York, USA, Warren K. Leffler, July 15, 1976. (Photo by: Universal History Archive/Universal Images Group via Getty Images) (Universal History Archive/Universal History Archive/Univer)

Jimmy Carter was home on a visit from the U.S. Naval Academy when he asked his sister Ruth’s friend Rosalynn Smith out on a date.

The date went well.

It went so well that he told his mother, Lillian, “She’s the girl I want to marry.”

The two grew close quickly, and they married a year later.

A year after that, in 1947, Carter was serving in the U.S. Navy and Rosalynn was pregnant. Their child, the first of four for the couple, was born the day before the July 4 holiday.

Here’s a look at Carter’s children, Jack, Chip, Jeff and Amy, and what they have accomplished in the years following their father’s presidency.

John William “Jack” Carter (born July 3, 1947) – The Carter’s eldest son, Jack, was born in Portsmouth, Virginia, when his father was serving in the U.S. Navy. In 1953, when Jack was 6, the family moved to Plains, Georgia, after the death of his grandfather, Earl Carter. Jack worked on the family farm when he was a child, making .10 cents an hour in the peanut farm warehouse.

He went to Georgia Tech, his father’s alma mater, in 1965, then went to Emory and Georgia Southwestern State University before he followed his father into the Navy in April 1968.

After being discharged from the Navy, Jack went back to college, earning a degree in nuclear physics from Georgia Tech. He went on to earn a law degree from the University of

Georgia in 1975, a year before his father would be elected president.

He married Juliet Langford and had two children, Jason and Sarah. The marriage did not last, and after the couple divorced, Jack married Elizabeth Brasfield in 1992. He has two stepchildren from that marriage.

Jack worked for the Chicago Board of Trade and Citibank before he started an investment company while living in Bermuda. He formed the Carter Global consulting firm in 2003 when the family moved to Nevada. He won the Democratic nomination for Nevada’s U.S. Senate seat in 2006, but lost in the general election.

James Earl “Chip” Carter III (born April 12, 1950) – Chip Carter, his father’s namesake, was born in Honolulu, Hawaii. Like his brother Jack, Chip worked in the family’s peanut business. He attended Georgia Southwestern State University and in 1973 married Caron Griffin. The couple had one child, James Earl Carter IV, and divorced in 1980.

Before his father was elected president, he worked for the Georgia State Energy Office. He worked on his father’s campaign, and while his father was in office he often served as his emissary, representing the president at events and meetings across the United States and in foreign countries. He and his family lived in the White House and he worked for the Democratic National Committee.

After his father lost the 1980 presidential election, Chip formed Carter/Smith and Associates, a firm that specialized in helping run political campaigns. He worked as a consultant specializing in establishing relationships between corporations and government, political, and corporate leaders in Africa, the Middle East, and China.

In 1995, he began work at Friendship Force International, a not-for-profit organization running an international exchange program with clubs in 57 countries. The program was founded by his parents. He volunteered for other causes his parents supported, such as Habitat for Humanity.

He married a second time and he and his wife, the former Ginger Hedges, had a daughter, Margaret Alicia. That marriage also ended in divorce. He married a third time to the former Becky Payne.

Donnel Jeffrey “Jeff” Carter (born Aug. 18, 1952) – Jeff Carter was born in New London, Connecticut on his mother’s birthday. He earned a degree in geography from George Washington University. He co-founded Computer Mapping Consultants, a company that by 1978 was doing business with the World Bank. He married Annette Davis in 1975 and lived with his parents in the White House during his father’s term.

The couple had three children, Joshua, Jeremy and James. Jeremy died in 2015 of a suspected heart attack.

Amy Lynn Carter Wentzel (born Oct. 19, 1967) – Amy was born in Plains, Georgia. She was 9 years old when her family moved into the White House, and much of her early life was documented by the press. She roller skated in the White House, had a pet cat, and was criticized for reading a book at a state dinner. Her father famously said during a debate with Ronald Reagan that he had asked her what the most pressing issue was in the 1980 election and said her response was “the control of nuclear arms.”

After her family left the White House, she finished grade school in Atlanta and enrolled in Brown University. She went on to earn and bachelor’s degree from Memphis College of Art and a master’s degree in art history from Tulane University. Carter illustrated her father’s children’s book, The Little Baby Snoogle-Fleejer, which was released in 1996.

She married James Wentzel in 1996, and the couple has one child.

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