Onboard Peanut One: The United Airlines 727 That Transported Jimmy Carter

A United Airlines Boeing 727 jet dubbed “Peanut One” played a critical role in US presidential history by serving as the primary aircraft for Jimmy Carter during his 1976 presidential campaign.

Jimmy Carter Chartered A United Airlines 727, Calling It Peanut One

While at the Jimmy Carter Center in Atlanta earlier his week to pay my respects, I noticed a United Airlines 727 model in Saul Bass livery that seemed out of place in Atlanta, the land of Delta jets. Looking closer, I found that Carter had charted a United 727 jet for his 1976 presidential campaign and dubbed it “Peanut One.”

Ironically, the pilot United assigned during the campaign was also named Jimmy Carter. Capitan James K. ‘Jimmy’ Carter flew or United Airlines from 1956 to 1992, including over 18,000 hours in the 727 from 1963 to his retirement at the age of 60.

United highlighted this link in a tweet after Carter’s death:

In 1976, a presidential hopeful campaigned across the country in an aircraft chartered by United that he called “Peanut One” – an homage to his family’s peanut farm.

We join the nation in remembering the life and service of Jimmy Carter. pic.twitter.com/NcY5mBYvhN

— United Airlines (@united) December 29, 2024

Here are some official White House photos of Carter onboard the 727:

President Jimmy Carter with Captain Jimmy Carter

A Final Word On Carter

Like many Americans, I watched his state funeral at Washington National Cathedral on Thursday and was moved by the tributes of those who knew him. Most of all, I was moved by the testimony of his grandson Jason, who shared:

I never perceived a difference between his public face and his private one. He was the same person, no matter who he was with or where he was. And for me, that’s the definition of integrity.

That honesty was matched by love. It was matched by faith. And in both public and private, my grandparents did fundamentally live their lives in effort, as the Bible says, to do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with their God.

Carter was a deeply committed Christian man who modeled what it means to die to yourself and serve others. We may not have been in full ideological or theological solidarity, but I wholly concur that not being double-tongued is a critical part of integrity.

Looking back on his life and particularly his presidency, I am moved by Carter’s willingness to pursue what he felt was right rather than what people wanted to hear.

His 1979 “malaise” speech was pretty audacious…pretty “in-your-face.”

It’s clear that the true problems of our Nation are much deeper-deeper than gasoline lines or energy shortages, deeper even than inflation or recession. And I realize more than ever that as President I need your help…

I want to talk to you right now about a fundamental threat to American democracy. I do not mean our political and civil liberties. They will endure. And I do not refer to the outward strength of America, a nation that is at peace tonight everywhere in the world, with unmatched economic power and military might…

In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. But we’ve discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. We’ve learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose.

Tough love…like a preacher who love his flock.

And he was quite right then and that is still true today.

While the speech was about rallying Americans to work toward energy independence (and today, we have largely achieved that goal, at least theoretically), it struck at the very heart of the American dilemma of what it means to be happy and content.

As the President-Elect talks about taking the Panama Canal by force, I cannot help but think how unpopular it was to expend so much political capital on the Panama Canal Treaty, but how Carter put the good of the nation over his short-term self-interests.

One of my greatest regrets is not going to one of Carter’s Sunday School classes in Plains, Georgia. Of all the ex-presidents, he was the most accessible and I wish I had made it a point to go. The one Sunday I was in Atlanta in 2017 was a Sunday he was away…

But as I look back on his legacy, including airline deregulation, I yearn for that integrity in our leaders and am thankful for a man who took his faith so seriously and spent his entire life working in the service of others. I hope one day the same will be said of me, for I cannot think of a higher earthly calling than loving God and loving others.