To the world, Jimmy Carter was a known as the 39th U.S. president, a humanitarian and Nobel Peace Prize winner, but to his grandson Hugo Wentzel, Carter was simply Paw-Paw.
Carter passed away on Sunday at his home in Plains, Georgia, at the age of 100.
In an interview with DailyMail.com, Wentzel shared new details about his final days and reflected on his inspirational life.
The 25-year-old said that his grandfather could not move around or really speak in the end, but he believes Carter was ‘happy with what he got to accomplish, the people he could help in his life.’
While sad over his grandfather’s passing, Wentzel said Carter was accepting of death in the end.
‘He really, really believes he’s going to heaven, he’s gonna be a better place. That really comforts me too,’ he said.
Wentzel is one of Carter’s 11 grandchildren and son of the late president’s daughter Amy, who was one of the late president’s primary caretakers in the end.
He found out that his grandfather was in his final hours of life in a call with his mom on Sunday just before the news broke. She was in Plains to be with her father when he passed.
An image of Hugo Wentzel with his grandfather President Jimmy Carter he shared on social media after the news that the 39th president had passed away at the age of 100 on Sunday
The last time Wentzel saw his Paw-Paw was right before his 100th birthday when he and his mom were visiting Plains together from their home in Atlanta.
During that visit, they had what he described as a very deep talk about life’s motivations and what influenced the late president over the years to keep going.
‘He’s the best person for life advice I think anyone could ever ask for, so it was amazing,’ Wentzel said.
‘First thing for him is he was super religious, so that is always his main driver, and he’ll tell anyone that ever talks about that, it’s just his faith drives him,’ Wentzel said.
His other takeaway from his final talk with his grandfather was to never give up in order to change the world.
‘He never stopped working on anything. He never gave up on any project,’ Wentzel said. ‘If he started doing something, he would finish it, no matter what happened to him.’
Wentzel had a unique upbringing as the grandson of a former president. As a child he spent a lot of time traveling with Carter on regular family trips. At the time, he did not think much of it, but looking back, he realized how remarkable it was.
‘We always went on our family trips, like, the craziest places,’ he recalled fondly.
Their adventures together took them to Nicaragua, Turkey (where they stayed at a hotel with ‘golden toilets’) and beyond.
Wentzel did not realize how unusual it was when he was younger that on one of their trips his grandfather dropped that they were supposed to have met up with Nelson Mandela.
A more recent image of Hugo Wentzel he shared on his Instagram in October
Late President Jimmy Carter with his grandson Hugo and late first lady Rosalynn Carter
Wentzel reflected on how his grandfather President Jimmy Carter wanted to be remembered not only as a human rights activist but also as a grandfather
Together, Carter and his family traveled the world including taking his grandchildren on regular trips after he left office
The 25-year-old laughed while reflecting that during another trip he became the youngest person ever to open the Panama Canal.
His comment on the canal comes at a pivotal time as President-elect Donald Trump as set his sights on the U.S. regaining control of the crucial waterway.
While Trump praised Carter in a statement following his death, he has criticized the 39th president for the treaty that turned control of the canal over to Panama.
Despite the hostilities over the years, Wentzel believes Trump will be invited to his grandfather’s funeral.
‘I think that right now while the country is going so crazy and everyone is so divided, I think him passing way is just important reminder that everyone needs to come together and love everyone no matter what’s going on all the time,’ he said.
Leading up to the presidential election, the Carter family made it no secret that the former president was holding out to vote for Kamala Harris. Wentzel said he was ‘very happy he got to do that’ and ‘did talk about that a lot.’
An image Wentzel shared in a post of his grandfather holding him after it was announced that President Carter had passed away. Wentzel wrote with the post that his Paw-Paw was the ‘most selfless person I’ve ever met in my entire life, and I’m not even joking when I say probably one of the most selfless humans in history’
Planning is still underway, but Wentzel believes there will be a small funeral for family and the close-knit people who live in Carter’s Plains community before the larger public celebrations of his life. His state funeral is set for January 9 in Washington, DC.
‘I think he would love to see how many people really love and care about him from every walk of life,’ Wentzel said. He said that includes Trump, Biden and other members of both parties all there together.
For Wentzel, he is trying to share the memory of his grandfather as Carter himself had said he wanted to be remembered: as a human rights activist and someone who cared about everyone equally but also as a grandfather.
‘A lot of people know him as a president, but I think something really important to him, and what he wanted as part of his legacy to be was that he was someone who cared for people close to him a lot, nonstop, no matter what was happening.’
Wentzel hopes to carry on some of his grandfather’s values and also have a positive impact
Wentzel said he hopes to carry on some of his grandfather’s values and also have a positive impact.
For now, the 25-year-old, an avid bodybuilder and often posts about fitness, is launching a fitness clothing line ‘All You’ which will be donating some of its proceeds to help disabled children get fit.
But he also suggested with a laugh that maybe there could be another Carter family member in politics – one day.
