Longtime Cherokee County resident Curtis Brown met the 39th president of the United States because he happened to be manager of a plant that made the right thing at the right time.
“My secretary told me President Jimmy Carter was on the line,” said Brown, who was manager of the Emerson plant in Peachtree in 1985. “I thought, oh, yeah, that’s got to be one of my friends. The pope’s calling me, too.”
As it turned out, it was no joke, as Brown could tell it was him as soon as Carter started speaking. It was also the start of a relationship with the former most powerful man in the world, who today is receiving hospice care at his home in Plains, Ga.
“Carter was visiting King’s Flea Market in Murphy. He’s a great woodworker and made most of the furniture at his cabin,” Brown said. “He burnt up the motor on his radial arm saw and asked if he could buy one. I told him, ‘I can’t sell you one, but I’d be glad to give you one.’ ”
That’s what led Carter and his Secret Service entourage to the old Emerson plant on U.S. 64 East Alternate/River Road, where they took a quickly arranged tour. Afterward, they went to lunch at The Sirloin in Murphy, where owner Steve Dickey greeted them. (That restaurant was where the Hampton Inn is today.)
On the drive back to the plant, Brown said a truck near them loudly backfired.
“It greatly alerted both of his Secret Service agents, one who I saw reach for his gun. I did this,” Brown said, ducking while sharing the memory. “But Carter didn’t blink. It didn’t faze him.”
Brown was later invited to dinner with Carter and his wife, Rosalyn, at the cabin he built in Cherry Log, Ga., where the Carters enjoyed meeting his children. They also ate barbecue a few times at The Pink Pig in nearby Ellijay, Ga., where Brown said this happened.
“Owner Bud Holloway made some home brew and offered us a shot. A Secret Service agent said he better try it first. So he chucked it down and” – Brown hacked for effect – “started coughing.
“Carter said, ‘Looks like it’s good to me,’ and we both chugged it down.”
A couple Secret Service agents also shared stories about Carter, who famously only slept about four hours a night.
“He was up jogging with Secret Service agents about 3 a.m. A heavyset officer was running with him and struggling mightily to keep up,” Brown said. “Seeing the officer get winded, and knowing he wouldn’t have stopped running save for a heart attack, Carter found a parking lot, had the heavier agent stand in the middle and ran around him in circles. Carter never treated his agents like servants. He and Rosalynn were courteous, polite and engaging.”
Brown met Carter again a year or two later, when country legend Willie Nelson held a concert for farm relief. Emerson ended up donating quite a bit of equipment over the years to one of the former president’s favorite nonprofits, Habitat for Humanity, where Carter put his carpentry skills to good use for others.
Brown and Bill Forsyth narrowly missed out on an opportunity to work side by side with Carter on a Habitat project in New York. Since they couldn’t make it, Brown sent one of his best workers, Stanley Barnett.
“I got a nice letter back from Carter thanking me for sending someone who knew what they were doing,” Brown said, laughing at the memory.
”He was a really good person; you don’t run across many like him. Carter put his Christian faith first,” said Brown, who attended one of Carter’s Sunday school classes at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains. “He was a family man, very intelligent and extremely knowledgeable of the world, though he never really talked about politics.
“I’m convinced that history will be kind to him – not only because of his contributions after he left office, but for some of the things Carter accomplished while he was president, like the Camp David Accords and trying to reduce our country’s dependence on foreign oil. He never cared about the potential impact on his popularity; he only cared about whether it was the right thing to do.”
Even after not speaking with him for a few years, the last time they spoke Carter asked about Brown’s children by name.
“He’s a truly decent man, the whole package,” Brown said. “He was a real south Georgia boy. I’ve never met anybody like him.”