LISTEN: Jason Carter speaks with GPB's Kristi York Wooten about the new Jimmy Carter Forever stamp and celebrating what would have been his grandfather's 101st birthday.
The United States Postal Service issued the Jimmy Carter Forever stamp in Atlanta Wednesday on what would have been the late former president's 101st birthday.
The stamp design was first revealed at an event in Carter's hometown of Plains, Ga., in August.
Stamp collectors from around the country and hundreds of locals celebrated the official issuance during an Oct. 1 event at the Carter Center in Atlanta.
Attendees lined up to purchase sheets of the first-class stamp, which is now available in post offices and online.
The Morehouse College Quartet sang the national anthem and postal service and Carter Center executives made remarks.
Carter Center board chair Jason Carter, told GPB writing letters was a fundamental part of the lives of his grandparents, Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.
"The love letters that he wrote to my grandmother, the letters that I wrote to them in the Peace Corps...when we were going through my grandfather's papers, we came across all of these letters that I had sent that he had saved," Jason Carter said.
"He's got a Forever stamp. We think of him as Jimmy Carter forever," he said. "And this Carter Center is filled still with his spirit in a very current way. So it's a great way to celebrate his birthday."
"The stamp itself is an honor for anyone, of course, but it really does validate in some ways the way that people think of my grandfather now," Carter said. "For human rights, for freedom, for democracy across the world, to alleviate human suffering — I think it's an example of him being respected in a way that is valuable to all of us."
