Jimmy Carter memories: Son of political opponent caught an early glimpse of Carter’s campaign savvy

Chuck Byrd's family goes way back with President Jimmy Carter, back to a time when the Democratic Party, and the pall of segregation, dominated Georgia politics.

His late father, Garland Byrd, ran against Carter for governor in 1966, both men part of a crowded Democratic primary field. Byrd was a former lieutenant governor, and Carter was serving in the state Senate.

For the younger Byrd, Carter’s death marks the end of an era – his father’s era.

"Jimmy Carter’s the last one," he said. "I look at photographs. They're all gone."

Garland Byrd poses for a photo with Jimmy Carter

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Chuck Byrd says one of his earliest memories of the future president happened during the 1966 campaign, in a Fourth of July parade in Rome. He was 12 years old.

"Back then, it was different," Byrd, a Macon attorney, told FOX 5. "Families gathered together on the campaign trail. We actually ate together. We talked to each other."

Chuck Byrd interviews with FOX 5 I-Team reporter Johnny Edwards.

He recalled all the candidates being asked to pick vehicles to ride in from local car dealers.

"And I looked at my father and I said, ‘I want that car.’ It was a Toronado. Classic, cutting-edge car," Byrd said. "My father said, ‘No, we're getting a Ford or a Chevrolet.'

Chuck Byrd explains the story behind Jimmy Carter's Toronado.

"Jimmy Carter's family goes straight to that Toronado."

His father and the other candidates rode the parade from inside their cars, Byrd said.

"When that parade started," he said, "Jimmy Carter got on the hood of that car and sat there and rode down the parade route. I was amazed by that."

Carter would nevertheless place third in that primary, and his father a distant fifth, marking the end of his political career. Lester Maddox would win the race for governor later that year.

Byrd said what he saw during the campaign, though, foreshadowed things to come.

Washington, D.C.: Jimmy, Amy and Rosalynn Carter walk in the inaugural parade in Washington, D.C. on January 20, 1977. (Photo by Dick Yarwood/Newsday RM via Getty Images)

"How many presidents do you know, when they’re inaugurated, walk down Pennsylvania Avenue?" he said. "He did the same thing in Rome, Ga. People just didn't remember it. I remembered it."

The Byrd and Carter families would become intertwined as the decades passed. Garland Byrd lived in Reynolds, just north of Plains, and ran a peanut-buying plant. Chuck Byrd's father-in-law was part of Carter's "Peanut Brigade" of presidential campaign volunteers. Chuck became friends with Carter’s grandson, Jason, as the two men practiced law.

Garland Byrd poses for a photo with Rosalynn Carter and former President Jimmy Carter. (Photo submitted by family)

The elder Byrd died in 1997 at age 72. A World War II combat veteran, he left a complicated political legacy, having run in 1966 as a segregationist. But his son said he also took heat for refusing to close public schools earlier in the decade, something segregationist whites demanded to resist school integration.

"I believe Jimmy Carter would agree with what my father said about those times, that I don't want to go back to the good old days," Byrd said. Rather, "What’s tomorrow gonna’ bring us? Is tomorrow going to be better? Well, let's get together and work for it."

Watch: Former President Jimmy Carter lies in state at US Capitol

History records Carter as mostly silent on the issue of segregation until winning office for Georgia governor. He declared in his 1971 inauguration speech, "The time for racial discrimination is over."

The Source: This is an original FOX 5 I-Team report. Johnny Edwards conducted interviews with Chuck Byrd, the son of Garland Byrd, for personal details about the 1996 campaign, which were fact-checked for this article.

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