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Sheri Mann Stewart (center), with sons Tendal Mann (left) and Royce Mann, holds a family photo with Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter.
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'Always call me Jimmy': Atlanta family remembers five generations of friendship with Jimmy Carter
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In this interview recorded after former President Jimmy Carter entered hospice care in 2023, GPB's Donna Lowry talks with Atlanta actress Sheri Mann Stewart and her sons Royce and Tendal about their family's long friendship with Jimmy Carter. Stewart's mother, Connie, worked on the team that created the Department of Education during President Carter's administration.
TRANSCRIPT
Donna Lowry: Welcome to a conversation with the Mann/Stewart family. They are going to talk about their relationship with former President Jimmy Carter. It goes back five generations. I am thrilled to have here Sheri Mann Stewart, Royce Mann and Tendal Mann to talk about this. Thank you so much for being here.
Lots to get into. But let's go back a little bit and let's start with how far back your family goes with Jimmy Carter's family.
Sheri Mann Stewart: So I'm old, and I've known five generations of his family, but it's thanks to my mom (Connie Ward Stewart). She really got our family connected with their family. So starting in her 20, she got to know Jimmy when he was a state senator. She got to know Jimmy and Rosalynn when he was a state senator. And she had been appointed by Gov. Carl Sanders at age 23 for her. She was the only woman on the state scholarship commission. So as the only woman, the men on the commission sort of chose her to do a lot of the work, not just get the coffee, which she refused after the first meeting, but to actually do the presentations, I think monthly or bimonthly or something to the state Senate. Jimmy was a senator and he got to see what a great job she did. And there's a story I can either tell right now or in a few minutes about the phone call that she received from Jimmy and Rosalynn when she was vacationing down on Jekyll Island Beach.
Donna Lowry: OK, go ahead and tell it.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Okay. So, you know, of course, there were no cell phones then. We're talking sixties, early sixties. And again, he had gone to know who she was. Rosalynn somehow had gone to know who she was, and they were impressed with her. And she was a journalism student. Might have even had her master's by then and might have even started teaching down at UGA School of Journalism.
She was down on Jekyll Island Beach on vacation and the manager of the hotel came down and found her on the beach and said, "You're Connie Stewart, right?"And she said, "Yes." And he said, "there's a call for you. They say it's important up in the lobby, in the office. Do you mind coming and taking it?" So she went up and of course, she was concerned immediately that her only child, something was wrong with me.
But she went up, and these voices said, "Connie, it's Jimmy and Rosalynn. We've decided to run for governor, and we'd like you to run the campaign with us and the family." And she said she took about a beat and said, all right. And so, they ran the first gubernatorial campaign, and she worked with she got to know me slowly and well therefore, I was getting to know Ms. Lillian, she and Jimmy’s sisters, Ruth and Gloria, became dear friends. They would stay at our house in Athens when they were coming through town. And, of course, she and Rosalynn got closer. And I got to, as a little girl, I got to see them many times through those years. And there are photos for me that ended up in newspapers and things where every time I'd see Jimmy, he'd hold out his arms, and I'd go run and jump in his arms, and he'd pick me up and give me big hugs.
And, so those are those five generations. And for me, it was my grandparents, Fred and Elsie Ward, there in Athens. And every time Jimmy would be on the campaign trail and be able to get himself over to their house, he'd pop in and surprise them and ask my grandmother, my Nanny, to give him a tour of her gardens because she was proud of her gardens and she was known all over the city. But he would hear that my granddaddy was in the hospital and the phone would ring and it would be literally President Carter calling from the White House, this kind of thing. So—
Donna Lowry: Really close relationship. I want to get back to your mom running the campaign. Talk about what that journey was with her and how I guess it informs us a little bit more about the former president in that he chose a woman for that position.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Absolutely. And that was one of the things she that she loved about working with him and Rosalynn, of course. He always — Roslynn was his right-hand partner all through the years also. So, she always included them together. But that was one of the reasons she wanted to work with him from the beginning and all through the years is not only did he want more women involved at that level and higher, but also people of color. He wanted as diverse a group of advisors and campaign folks and folks at the White House and in his administration later on in D.C., as possible. And that was from the beginning. And he and my mom also shared very strong values about education and equality in education.
Donna Lowry: This was an uphill battle because this was the '60s. This was Georgia.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Right.
Donna Lowry: He was running for governor.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Yep.
Donna Lowry: And so he had to he was going against the grain on so many levels.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Exactly. And he lost that first gubernatorial campaign. But they asked my mom to keep working with him to run again because he had achieved name recognition, which they had sort of said is one of their main goals. They knew that it was an uphill battle for him to win that first time. But since he had only been known in the Plains/Americus area when he became a senator, he needed to get his name across the whole state, and they did succeed at that. And then the second campaign was a bit easier, although it still had its challenges.
Donna Lowry: So tell us a little bit more about your what you've learned about your family and Jimmy Carter since — since office.
Royce Mann: I mean, I think definitely one of the reasons that I still see hope in our political landscape is because of people like President Carter, who spent their whole lives dedicated to really clear and good values — values of human rights, of peace, of equality, and it was not always easy. I mean, looking at his second gubernatorial campaign, you know, he took a more moderate tone.
Donna Lowry: Sherry, you came into this world knowing the family, right?
Sheri Mann Stewart: I honestly have to say — and I'll get a little teary — Jimmy became a father figure for me. And I think he accepted that role. And I think Rosalynn accepted it. And Rosalynn loved me and my mom also. And so I think my mom sort of allowed that to happen, that Jimmy — I, I literally would write Jimmy letters as a child. And sometimes he would respond: I have this letter from when he was governor and I had written him about an idea I had that there would be a Georgia cleans up day. I forget what I called it. I have a copy of it, of course. And he wrote me back, a long letter back. What a great idea that I was a young person thinking about the environment and all. And so, you know, all through the years, he early, early on, at some point when I tried to call him Gov. Carter and then later President Carter, he said, "Sheri Lyn, what did you just call me?" And I said, "Well, Gov. Carter." He said, "You better always call me Jimmy." And so ever since then, I've taken that very seriously. And that's why I don't disrespectfully use I just refer to him as Jimmy because he ordered me to do that.
Donna Lowry: Well, I've learned something. "Sheri Lyn," huh?
Sheri Mann Stewart: Yes!
Donna Lowry: So, Tendal, I'm not ignoring you. You're the oldest. Do you remember your first? Do you have memories of meeting him?
Tendal Mann: Oh, I mean, I couldn't even pinpoint the first one, but I, you know, can for as long as I can remember, you know, remember having Jimmy and the Carters kind of being a part of our life. And I can remember even as a young child going down to Plains, Ga.
Sheri Mann Stewart: He always made a point of when he would see the boys there at the different events, he would come and give us the little private tour of the boyhood home and tell them particular things about, you know, then my daddy built, you know, put the bucket in here to be the shower for us. And he would tell the particular stories and he would hold them in his arms and put them on his lap, either at, you know, the Carter Center or during the board of Council meetings or at Ebenezer. Both of you, I think your first time going to a, quote, "church" was to hear him teach one of the Sunday school services.
Donna Lowry: Wow. Royce. So what are your memories?
Royce Mann: Yeah, I just like Tendal, don't remember the first time I met him because it was when I was an infant. But I've been told this story. My middle name is Carter in his honor.
Sheri Mann Stewart: His and Rosalynn's honor.
Royce Mann: Yes, his and Rosalynn’s honor. And he would always refer to me as Carter, never by my first name. But getting to sit with him at the Carter Center and just ask him questions, as I think I was an 11-year-old about his work, about the ideas and the goals that he had when he was my age and a little bit older, and how he realized those and how he never strayed from his values. Those are lessons that I'll always carry with me.
Donna Lowry: I have to mention that you've run for office.
Royce Mann: Yes.
Donna Lowry: You ran. Tell us about it. You ran for Atlanta School Board.
Royce Mann: Yeah, I ran for Atlanta Board of Education. And I definitely think my passion for education and for public policy and the potential that it has for uplifting people, especially young people, and creating the world we want to see is due to President Carter, Rosalynn, and especially my grandmother, Connie Stewart, who worked with President Carter to launch the U.S. Department of Education.
Donna Lowry: Legacy. Quite a legacy. I do want to talk more about your mom and that part of things. So that was her early — you said she was in her early 20s, right?
Sheri Mann Stewart: Yeah. She was 23.
Donna Lowry: Right. So that that really kind of lit the fire for her in — when it came to, quote, "politics" and things like that.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Absolutely.
Donna Lowry: And then, under the Carter administration. Talk about all of those things that happened.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Right. So I think one thing that Jimmy saw when she would make the presentations on behalf of Gov. Sanders to the state Senate, he saw her knowledge of and passion about education. And again, she may have already started teaching at UGA, but either way, she had gotten her master's degree and all that. And, that's one passion that she and Jimmy shared from the very beginning was their hopes for education — and education in the state and in the country. And they literally started talking about early on, they started talking about "why doesn’t education have an equal seat at the table at the federal level?" Why is it buried in between these two other very important departments of Health and Welfare, which takes so much attention? Doesn't it need its own equal seat at the table? And this was an early conversation they had. My understanding was, you know, when either when he was running for governor or became governor, there were the early days. And I have her whole life of all the papers that she wrote as part of her thesis and papers through the years about education. But a lot of those were inspired by and informed by conversations that she was having with Jimmy and Rosalynn about the issues with education at the time and how they could improve on that.
But, skipping back a minute, when he did get elected governor, he pretty quickly also saw the potential of the film industry in Georgia and he created the nation's first film office connected to state government. He saw he had been able to get some fundraising campaigns from folks who didn't just live in Georgia but around the country, including California. And he had traveled out there and saw the potential and thought about how much money could come into the state of Georgia if he could get films to be made here. And so he started the nation's first. He appointed my mom to be on the first commission of the country. And later on, when she — a later story is when she ended up at Michigan State University as the first female VP in the Big 10 after the Carter administration. But the Michigan State started a state department, also of film, and got put on that to learn what Georgia had done.
Donna Lowry: I want to include here to people who don't know that you're an actress and a producer.
Sheri Mann Stewart: Yes, we're all actors and, you know, and that's deftly inspired by — I used to visit with my mom when she was on the commission, the Film Commission of Georgia. She would take me to film sets, including the infamous Poor Pretty Eddie. You can read stories about that online because I looked this week. But, you know, I got to meet people like Leslie Uggams, who signed in my little autograph book, and Michael Christian and all these interesting folks, Shelley Winters. And these were things that Jimmy created for the state of Georgia, which obviously has lasted and built and brings in $9 billion or something.
Donna Lowry: And he doesn't get the credit for what's going on right now. Of course, the Georgia film credit is a big part of everything, but I had no idea it went back that far…
Sheri Mann Stewart: Yes. Yeah.
Donna Lowry: …to his administration.
Sheri Mann Stewart: A lot of people don't know that. He started it for the country. No other governor had thought to do this. And that became the model for the rest of the country. So, we can thank him for that.
Royce Mann: And if I can just jump in, they had a great exhibit on this at the Carter Center — a temporary exhibit. I don't know where all the stuff is now — but that really laid out how it, you know, has grown from that first commission and those first ideas of trying to create a Hollywood of the South to what we have now.
Donna Lowry: Okay. I want to thank you so much, Sheri Mann Stewart, Royce and Tendal Mann, for talking with us and sharing these special stories about the former president. I mean, they're just treasures that you guys —
Sheri Mann Stewart: And there are more and more. I keep thinking I didn’t tell you the pope story. Sorry about that.
Donna Lowry: Great stories. Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts and having this conversation.
All: Thank you.
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