“The Best Vote I Ever Cast”: Niceville Woman’s Friendship with Jimmy Carter

Niceville woman shares memories of time spent with Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter

When the news broke that former president Jimmy Carter had passed away on Sunday afternoon at the age of 100, Niceville resident Pamela Smith took to social media to express her grief.

“My hero has moved to a place where everyone will call him a hero,” Smith wrote on her Facebook page. “I am thankful for the opportunities to hear him speak and work with him (and Mrs. Carter.)”

Smith, a retired teacher, first met Carter in the late 1980s, when she was in graduate school at the University of Alabama.

“He came to Tuscaloosa to speak, and I took my sons with me to see him,” she recalled. “We had seats right in the front row, and amazingly enough we were able to go right up and speak to him afterwards. I told him that I had cast my first ever vote for him, and he smiled that big smile and said, ‘That’s the best vote you ever cast.”

After that first encounter, Smith learned that the public was welcome to attend the Sunday School classes Jimmy Carter taught at Maranatha Baptist Church in his hometown of Plains, Georgia.

“Over the years, I made around seven or eight trips to visit there,” she said. “I wish I could have gone more.”

An accomplished pianist, Smith was invited to play at two or three different services at the church, which Carter had helped to found.

“Every time I played, he would come up afterwards to thank me,” Smith remembered. “He was such a genuinely kind and thoughtful person. He was so friendly, approachable, and humble. I remember on one visit, I saw an older woman approach him about some work that needed to be done in the church yard. He told her he would look into it.

“I later heard Mrs. Carter say that Jimmy would be happy to take care of it, because he just loved using that riding lawn mower!”

Smith became emotional as she recalled the connection she felt to Carter.

“Even as a young person, I remember being impressed by the way he started his Inaugural Address by thanking President Ford for his service to his country,” Smith said. “Here he was, in front of the whole world, showing how much he appreciated his predecessor. What a man of integrity.”

Smith said she was particularly moved by the scripture passage quoted at Carter’s inauguration.

“I’ve always loved that passage from Micah, Chapter 8 Verse 6 – ‘He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.’ As a Christian, he embodied every tenet of Jesus’ teachings.”

During their decades of post-presidential life, the Carters devoted themselves to the work of the Carter Center and charitable organizations such as Habitat for Humanity. While many historians classify his presidency as unsuccessful, Smith begs to differ. 

“I have taught several classes about Carter, and I frequently hear people say that he was a great ex-president, but that he failed as president,” she said. “I would respond by reminding them that he managed to bring together Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin to create a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel. How many lives were saved and well-lived because of that?

“I heard a commentator on TV observe that in his lifetime, Carter met millions of people who came away from their encounters thinking that he was their friend,” she added. “I guess I am one of those people. It seems weird to think of the world without him in it.”