#FlashbackFriday: Jimmy Carter’s Exchange Visits
Former President Jimmy Carter, who died Dec. 29 at age 100, made a few Exchange visits during his presidency.
The first, pictured above, occurred in March 1977, less than two months after he became president. On March 16, Carter flew into Hanscom Air Force Base in Massachusetts, where he held a town hall meeting in Clinton, roughly 30 miles from Hanscom.
The trip to Hanscom was Carter’s first ride on Air Force One as president. Upon arrival, he mingled with the crowd at the airport, then shook hands with people in a crowd outside the Hanscom Exchange, speaking with a number of Exchange associates.
In July 1979, when Carter, his wife Rosalynn and daughter Amy visited Hickam Air Force Base in Hawaii, the Exchange was there to greet them—and about 250 members of the international press.
Dale Parker, Hawaii Area Exchange food operations manager, monitors the operation of a mobile food truck during President Carter’s stop at Hickam Air Force Base in 1979.
When the print and broadcast journalists and their crews headed toward a makeshift media room set up in a hangar, they were greeted by an Exchange mobile food truck serving coffee and doughnuts. (Carter didn’t partake, but according to an August 1979 Exchange Post story, the coffee was much appreciated by the entourage, which arrived at Hickam before 6:30 a.m.)  Hickam was a brief stopover for the president, who was returning from Japan for an economic summit conference, and then South Korea, where he inspected U. S. forces.
Carter’s visits also included the Elmendorf Air Force Exchange in Alaska, although the Exchange Post archives don’t have a lot of details about his stop. The back door of the Exchange’s Galaxy Cafeteria was adjacent to the base’s passenger terminal, where dignitaries often landed. Ann Traylor, food activity manager of the cafeteria, met some of them—including Carter and his vice president, Walter Mondale.
After his presidency, Carter and Rosalynn were among a U.S. delegation—which also included former presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford, as well as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Reagan Administration Secretary of State Alexander Haig and Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger—that attended the funeral of Anwar Sadat, the Egyptian president who was assassinated in October 1981.
On their way to and from the funeral, the delegation stopped at Torrejon Air Base in Spain. An advance party of Secret Service agents and media members was served at the base’s Oasis Cafeteria, where Spain Area Exchange associates helped by busing tables. On the return trip from Egypt, the delegation stopped in at Torrejon’s main Exchange, where they expressed their interest and appreciation to the AAFES employees for their efforts and service (and did some shopping—Weinberger bought some Waterford Crystal glassware).
Sources: Exchange Post archives, Boston Globe, Hartford Courant, Honolulu Star-Bulletin, Newspapers.com
