ATLANTA – Amy Carter was just 9 years old when her father, Jimmy Carter, became the 39th President of the United States in 1977. With her golden locks and shy demeanor, the youngest Carter quickly caught the public’s attention as the first child to live in the White House since the Kennedy children.

Carter, 57, led a largely private life but has been thrust back into the spotlight, first by the death of her mother in 2023 and now by the death of her father. She is once again in front of the cameras that once followed her every move in the White House. During Tuesday’s memorial service in the Captol Rotunda, cameras seemed to constantly pan to Amy Carter, who has rarely appeared in public in the past two decades.

Born on October 19, 1967 in Plains, Georgia, Amy was the youngest of Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter’s four children. Her arrival was a family decision; The Carters voted on whether they should have another child. She moved to Atlanta with her family when she was just three years old when her father became governor of Georgia. Seven years later she moved into the White House.

As the first daughter, Amy became a symbol of youthful innocence. She roller-skated around the East Room, hosted sleepovers in her treehouse on the South Lawn and cared for her Siamese cat, Misty Malarky Ying Yang – the last cat to live in the White House until the Clintons brought their own cat.

SEE ALSO: Why Rosalynn Carter hired a convicted murderer to be her White House nanny

Despite her playful image, Amy occasionally made headlines for her precocious approach to serious topics. During her father’s presidential debate with Ronald Reagan in 1980, President Carter mentioned that Amy’s biggest concern was nuclear arms control. Her intellectual curiosity was also evident at state dinners. At an event for Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau in 1977, she was seen reading “Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator” and “The Story of the Gettysburg Address” during formal toasts.

Amy attended Stevens Elementary School and Rose Hardy Middle School in Washington, D.C. before returning to Atlanta to attend high school at Woodward Academy. She later pursued higher education, earning a bachelor’s degree from Brown University and a master’s degree from Tulane University.

Although she largely withdrew from public life, Amy occasionally advocated for causes in which she believed. In the 1980s and 1990s she protested against US foreign policy regarding South African apartheid and Central America. In 1986, she was one of 13 people, including activist Abbie Hoffman, arrested for demonstrating against CIA recruitment at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She was acquitted in a highly publicized trial.

In 1995, Amy worked with her father and illustrated his children’s book, The Little Baby Snoogle-Fleejer. She also served on the Advisory Board of the Carter Center and contributed to the family’s legacy of humanitarian work.

After spending several years away from her public life in Atlanta, Amy Carter re-entered the public eye in 2023 following the death of her mother, Rosalynn Carter. During the funeral, she read a love letter her father had written to her mother. Now she mourns the loss of her father, Jimmy Carter, whose life and legacy are honored by the nation.

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