A United Airlines Boeing 727 jet dubbed “Peanut One” played a critical role in US presidential history by serving as the primary aircraft for Jimmy Carter during his 1976 presidential campaign.
Jimmy Carter Chartered A United Airlines 727, Calling It Peanut One
While at the Jimmy Carter Center in Atlanta earlier his week to pay my respects, I noticed a United Airlines 727 model in Saul Bass livery that seemed out of place in Atlanta, the land of Delta jets. Looking closer, I found that Carter had charted a United 727 jet for his 1976 presidential campaign and dubbed it “Peanut One.”
Ironically, the pilot United assigned during the campaign was also named Jimmy Carter. Capitan James K. ‘Jimmy’ Carter flew or United Airlines from 1956 to 1992, including over 18,000 hours in the 727 from 1963 to his retirement at the age of 60.
United highlighted this link in a tweet after Carter’s death:
In 1976, a presidential hopeful campaigned across the country in an aircraft chartered by United that he called "Peanut One" – an homage to his family's peanut farm.
We join the nation in remembering the life and service of Jimmy Carter. pic.twitter.com/NcY5mBYvhN
— United Airlines (@united) December 29, 2024
Here are some official White House photos of Carter onboard the 727:
A Final Word On Carter
Like many Americans, I watched his state funeral at Washington National Cathedral on Thursday and was moved by the tributes of those who knew him. Most of all, I was moved by the testimony of his grandson Jason, who shared:
I never perceived a difference between his public face and his private one. He was the same person, no matter who he was with or where he was. And for me, that’s the definition of integrity.
That honesty was matched by love. It was matched by faith. And in both public and private, my grandparents did fundamentally live their lives in effort, as the Bible says, to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with their God.
Carter was a deeply committed Christian man who modeled what it means to die to yourself and serve others. We may not have been in full ideological or theological solidarity, but I wholly concur that not being double-tongued is a critical part of integrity.
Looking back on his life and particularly his presidency, I am moved by Carter’s willingness to pursue what he felt was right rather than what people wanted to hear.
His 1979 “malaise” speech was pretty audacious…pretty “in-your-face.”
It’s clear that the true problems of our Nation are much deeper-deeper than gasoline lines or energy shortages, deeper even than inflation or recession. And I realize more than ever that as President I need your help…
I want to talk to you right now about a fundamental threat to American democracy. I do not mean our political and civil liberties. They will endure. And I do not refer to the outward strength of America, a nation that is at peace tonight everywhere in the world, with unmatched economic power and military might…
In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. But we’ve discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. We’ve learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose.
Tough love…like a preacher who love his flock.
And he was quite right then and that is still true today.
While the speech was about rallying Americans to work toward energy independence (and today, we have largely achieved that goal, at least theoretically), it struck at the very heart of the American dilemma of what it means to be happy and content.
As the President-Elect talks about taking the Panama Canal by force, I cannot help but think how unpopular it was to expend so much political capital on the Panama Canal Treaty, but how Carter put the good of the nation over his short-term self-interests.
One of my greatest regrets is not going to one of Carter’s Sunday School classes in Plains, Georgia. Of all the ex-presidents, he was the most accessible and I wish I had made it a point to go. The one Sunday I was in Atlanta in 2017 was a Sunday he was away…
But as I look back on his legacy, including airline deregulation, I yearn for that integrity in our leaders and am thankful for a man who took his faith so seriously and spent his entire life working in the service of others. I hope one day the same will be said of me, for I cannot think of a higher earthly calling than loving God and loving others.
Highly recommend Kai Bird’s “The Outlier.” It’s a biography of Carter’s presidency and a reflection of the decent, honorable man he was. Well worth the read.
Amen! What a lovely post.
Captain James K. Carter died in 2006.
Going to President Carter’s Sunday School class might have been good for the tourist, good for President Carter’s ego, but disruptive for the regular church member.
President Carter had a good reputation as a good man after his presidency. Jimmy Carter was not a good man.
1. He was vicious towards his enemies. He threatened his lieutenant governor, using all of his power, if he dared to go against him.
2. He was uppity with the Secret Service agents guarding him, treating them like slaves in a plantation.
3. He was a loose cannon, thinking he could negotiate with North Korea directly with no input or contact with the US State Department or the President. He just acted on his own, which is really dangerous to national security and acting like a dictator.
4. He had no loyalty except maybe to his wife. He tore up a mutual defense treaty with the Republic of China on Taiwan and closed the embassy in Taipei. In the 1970’s, the US had the might to negotiate dual recognition of Taipei and Beijing. It would have been a tough sell but Beijing may have budged. If they didn’t, there would be lots of American manufacturing jobs. If Beijing budged, the rest of the world would copy the U.S. Now it’s way too late to undo the damage.
5. He remained a puppet of Beijing. On his condolences page of the Carter Center, there is a drop down box where you must indicate your country. They don’t have “Taiwan” but rather “Taiwan, Province of China”. They forget (jest, ok) to put “United States, Province of China”.
6. He claims to be a lover of human rights but tried to get the Iranian military to overthrow both the Shah and Khomeni when the Shah looked like he had to flee. What human rights lover tries to start a military coup?
7. He supported Israeli aggression because of the Bible. He even said that about the Bible. True, Israeli aggression is because they correctly think the Arabs are aggressive, too. Carter mistakenly used the Bible as a reason for Israeli imperialism. The legal borders are the 1948 borders. Israel took more than it should even though the 1948 borders were generous to Israel. Israel did not even offer compensation for seized land. Cuba was the same way. Israel wants land? It should pay the owners for it, not steal it.
8. Like thinking the Secret Service was trash, Carter disrespect the US military. When there was high inflation, he vetoed a proposed pay increase, freezing the pay despite double digit inflation.
I would like to think Carter was a great but misunderstood president or that he was a decent man. He is trash. On the same level as the next president, D.T. (but in different ways).
@derek … Did you know him , then ?
How do you know all this ?
How can you declare what Israel ought to do ?
What is your opinion of Billy Carter ?
I did not know President Carter personally but I knew very well when he wanted to shaft military pay. This is an excerpt…
…..The Carter Administration has announced its intention to put an
arbitrary ceiling of 5.5 percent on the
cost of Jiving adjustment to military
pay scheduled to go into effect on
October 1. ….. Unfortunately, this ceiling is planned for a year in which inflation will exceed 10 percent, thus leaving the military pay at least 4.5 percent behind the cost of living. This might be a tolerable situation if the military men and women were asked to pay a one-time penalty in the interest of convincing everyone else of the need to make a sacrifice for the common good. But this is not the first time military pay has been constrained….
If he’d just have stayed out of politics, particularly post presidency, and we could honor a fine man.
Derek comments should be removed—no sources just a bitter person writing
All of what I wrote can be sourced with Google. Yes, asking for censorship is no better than Putin or the People’s Republic of China.
An underrated President and a superb human being. Even his political opponents never tried to imply that Carter lacked honor and integrity.
Of course his political opponents never implied Carter lacked honor and integrity because they all believed in government power over the life of the individual whether through taxation, criminalization, or regulation. No man has integrity or is honorable if he supports people being arrested for not paying taxes or not using the “correct” pronouns. The only difference is Carter was an outsider who probably believed what he was doing was right even if it was wrong and he likely was not bought and paid for as much as other politicians are today from the Israel lobby.
One could say Carter was a better man than most politicians but still not a good one. His policies were atrocious and that ruined our future.
“Ironically, the pilot United assigned during the campaign was also named Jimmy Carter”
Ok, Alanis. I think that’s coincidental, not ironic. Irony would have been if the pilot was named Gerald Ford.
He was the worst president ever.