The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands expresses its sincere condolences to the family of President Jimmy Carter, who died Sunday at 100 years of age.

While President Carter was never a guest at Sunnylands, the nation’s 39^th president and his wife, Rosalynn, shared decades of friendship and correspondence with Sunnylands founders Walter and Leonore Annenberg, a relationship centered on their shared interests in charity and diplomacy.

“At the beginning of another year, I want to tell you how much your contributions to the Carter Center have meant to me,” Rosalynn Carter wrote to the Annenbergs in 2002.  “Having worked on mental health issues for over 30 years, I am particularly grateful for your help for our mental health program.”

A year later, Rosalynn Carter visited Sunnylands a day before five former First Ladies celebrated the 20^th anniversary of the Betty Ford Center in Rancho Mirage.

The Annenberg relationship with the Carters appears to have originated in 1973, when Walter Annenberg was the U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom and Carter, then governor of Georgia, was planning a visit to London.

After delivering the commencement speech at the University of Pennsylvania in 1998, President Carter returned to Georgia on the Annenbergs’ private Gulfstream plane. Both Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter were awarded honorary degrees at the ceremony for their work in international diplomacy, human rights, and commitment to higher education.

In a 2005 letter, President Carter congratulated Leonore Annenberg for receiving the Global Leadership Award from the United Nations Association of the United States of America. “You have played a significant role in furthering the mission of the U.N. Charter through your many good works, particularly in the field of education,” he wrote.