The peanut farmer who went on to serve as president, Jimmy Carter, has died. At 100 years of age, Carter was the longest living past president in U.S. history. Carter was raised on the family farm near Plains, Georgia during the Great Depression. After a term as governor, Carter won the presidency in 1976. Minnesota Senator Walter Mondale was his vice president and Minnesota Congressman Bob Bergland, who farmed at Roseau, was his agriculture secretary. It was a difficult time for the economy with the average year-over-year inflation rate under President Carter at 9.9 percent. The late 1970s was also the beginning of the farm crisis. After the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, Carter implemented a grain embargo sending grain prices south. The American Agriculture Movement brought thousands of farmers to Washington, D.C. in a tractorcade, to protest farm policy and seek a revision in the 1977 farm bill. Carter won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.
