An Intimate Farewell to Rosalynn Carter

Close family and friends say final goodbye to their first lady.

Close family and friends say a final goodbye to former First Lady Rosalynn Carter. (Credit: The Carter Center)

Family and friends said a final goodbye to humanitarian advocate Rosalynn Carter in an intimate gathering at the Marantha Baptist Church in the town where she and husband of 77 years, President Jimmy Carter, were born.

The former first lady died in her home in Plains, Georgia, on Nov. 19, two days after it was announced that she entered hospice care and six months after she was diagnosed with dementia. Her husband, the 39th president of the United States, watched silently as he sat in a wheelchair dressed in a suite and tie. He is 99 years old and entered hospice care in February.

Family members eulogized Rosalynn Carter on this last day of a three-day series of ceremonies in south Georgia and Atlanta that included a memorial service on Tuesday that drew sitting and past presidents and all the living first ladies.

“First lady. That is who she was,” says Marantha Pastor Tony Lowd…