Jimmy Carter is approaching the century mark, dwarfing his fellow presidents

When Jimmy Carter entered hospice care at his home in Georgia last year, his family and friends thought he had just days to live. More than 19 months later, he turns 100 on Tuesday, making him the first president in American history to celebrate the centennial.

The final chapter of Mr. Carter's already remarkable life story proves to be one of astonishing resilience. The peanut farmer turned global statesman has beaten brain cancer, recovered from a broken hip and outlived his political opponents over the years. And now he's setting a record for presidential consistency that will be hard to break.

Although frail and generally confined to his modest ranch house in Plains, Georgia, Mr. Carter has not only refused to give in to the inevitability of time, he has also perked up in recent months, according to family members. He's become a little more involved again and is telling his children and grandchildren that he wants to reach a new milestone – not his birthday, which he says isn't that important, but Election Day so he can vote for Vice President Kamala Harris.

“It’s a gift,” Josh Carter, one of his grandchildren, said of the last few months. “It’s a gift I didn’t know we would receive.”

Mr. Carter had already surpassed all his predecessors to become the longest-living president, but some of those who have witnessed his stubborn irascibility over the decades said they were not surprised that he was nearing his second century.

“This is Jimmy,” said Gerald Rafshoon, his White House communications director and a longtime friend. “It's almost like he's been going against the norm his whole life. Tell him he can’t do something, just tell him that and you’ll see the determination.”

Mr. Carter's hometown of Plains, the tiny speck on the map in southwest Georgia with a population of just under 500, is celebrating his birthday with a flyover by military jets, a naturalization ceremony for 100 new citizens and a concert. Supporters already gave a lively concert at the Fox Theater in Atlanta this month, which was televised on Tuesday, including performances by the B-52s, BeBe Winans and others, as well as videotaped tributes from most other presidents.

Mr. Carter was unable to attend in person. He is physically weakened. There are days when his grandchildren and great-grandchildren travel to Plains only to be told he can't see them.

The death last year of his wife, former first lady Rosalynn Carter, was devastating and disorienting, relatives said. After 77 years of marriage, many around him assumed that he would soon follow her.

“When she died, we all honestly thought he wasn't going to live much longer,” said Jason Carter, another grandson and chairman of the board of the Carter Center, the philanthropic institution founded by the former president and first lady. “And I think he had a real low moment for a while. But in the last few months he’s really re-engaged with the world.”

The former president listens to music, including old friends like Bob Dylan and the Allman Brothers Band. His favorite song is “Unanswered Prayers” by Garth Brooks. He asks about working at the Carter Center and shares his opinion on the state of the Atlanta Braves. Ronald Acuña Jr.'s season-ending knee injury caused frustration.

He followed the presidential election. He considers President Biden both a friend and a political ally, recalling that as a young senator from Delaware, Mr. Biden was among the first national Democrats to support his 1976 presidential bid.

Mr. Biden's decision to end his re-election bid in July inspired a degree of pride and respect in Mr. Carter, Jason Carter said. The former president's work monitoring elections and promoting democracies had taught him how rare it was for a leader to decide to give up power for the good of his party and his country.

“This is a big – historically big – deal,” Jason Carter said. “Just like the rest of us, he couldn’t believe what we were seeing because it was so unprecedented, and I think that really touched him too.”

The Carter family's support for Ms. Harris is due in part to their strong disapproval of former President Donald J. Trump. Mr. Trump has “a meanness and a darkness” that the family sees as the opposite of Mr. Carter's philosophy, Jason Carter said.

Not surprisingly, Mr. Trump was the only president not asked to send a video tribute to the Atlanta concert. Instead, he used Mr. Carter as a punchline in the campaign to mock Mr. Biden before the incumbent president left the race. “He makes Jimmy Carter look like a genius by comparison,” Trump said at a rally last summer.

Of course, Mr. Trump makes Mr. Carter look popular in comparison. In a Gallup poll last year, 57 percent of Americans approved of Mr. Carter's presidency, compared with just 46 percent who approved of Mr. Trump's presidency.

In part, this may be due to the revisionist wave of nostalgia since Mr. Carter went into hospice. He was once considered a failed president who lost re-election and became a globally admired philanthropist after leaving the White House. It has benefited from a re-evaluation over the last 19 months.

“He's already a part of history, and so many people who get to know him now don't remember his presidency,” said E. Stanly Godbold Jr., the author of a two-volume biography of Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter. “And that could be a good thing. They may have a more distant view.”

In the weeks since Mr. Biden's withdrawal, Mr. Carter has been particularly enthusiastic about Ms. Harris, who has called several times to check on the former president, particularly after the death of his wife.

“This doesn’t gain her a supporter – she has our support,” Jason Carter said. “But I think there was just a real personal kinship. I think my grandfather obviously believes in her story as a true example of the American dream.”

As he reached his 80s and 90s, Mr. Carter stood out for his vitality and defiance of the toll of aging. At age 90, he published his memoirs and only slightly reduced his role at the Carter Center. He continued to teach at Emory University in Atlanta and taught Sunday school regularly at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains.

At the Atlanta concert celebration this month, Monica Pearson, a longtime Atlanta television news anchor, recalled once telling him, “90 is the new 60 – and I was absolutely right!”

Ultimately, however, for family members and caregivers, this determination to stay active could look a lot like stubbornness showing up to teach Sunday school when everyone advised against it, or helping build houses with Habitat for Humanity while injured and covered in blood after a fall .

In 2019, just before Mr. Carter was scheduled to report for what was then his annual mission to build homes for the underprivileged, Jonathan TM Reckford, the executive director of Habitat for Humanity International, heard on the news that the former president was in the hospital. “I just panicked,” Mr. Reckford recalls. “Then I got a quick call from him, a bit grumpy. 'I'm doing well. See you there.' And he shows up with a black eye and a big bandage around his head.”

“It really embodied who he is,” Mr. Reckford added. “There are people who come out for photo ops, and that’s not President Carter.”

Other volunteers previously asked to be assigned to the house Mr. Carter was working on, but Mr. Reckford warned it was not for the faint of heart. “It's not a competition – as long as President Carter's house gets finished first,” he said. “You don’t want the submarine commander to get the impression that you’re not working hard enough.”

The country witnessed this gross disregard for restrictions last November when Mr. Carter emerged from hospice care and traveled to Atlanta for his wife's memorial service.

“I don’t know what keeps him going,” Jason Carter said. “I don't think he knows how to give up anything.” However, he added that he was worried that his bedridden grandfather would no longer have new experiences. “He’s so physically weak,” Jason Carter said. “I'm just worried he's not having fun.”

Josh Carter said he would not meet a president or a celebrated humanitarian during his visit. “When I come back to Plains, he’s my grandfather,” said Josh Carter — the same one who took him to his woodshop and instilled in him a passion for woodworking.

The former president gave Josh everything in his woodshop on two conditions: that he use it and that he start immediately and not wait until after his grandfather's death. He obeyed and used his grandfather's tools to build a cabinet to celebrate his grandparents' 75th wedding anniversary.

Mr. Carter's children and their spouses – including his sons Jeff and Chip and his daughter Amy – were most directly involved in his care and provided reports of his condition to the larger family.

“The caregiving side takes its toll, as it would in any family,” Jason Carter said. “I think we’re all surprised he’s still here.”

“You know,” he added, “he might well be immortal.”