I was born in 1947 in Portsmouth, VA., the first of three Navy brats born to Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter. Two brothers, Chip and Jeff, arrived within a few years and a sister, Amy, followed in 1967 - Dad having won a 15-year skirmish for a last try at a girl after putting Mom through raising 3 boys largely by herself while he was out to sea.

In 1953, the family moved to Plains, GA, following the death of my Grandfather, Earl Carter. Shortly after I arrived, I took my first job: keeping the office for Dad on Saturdays, answering the phone, and generally doing what I was told. Thus began a long career at Carter's Warehouse. As I got older, the standard job involved moving peanuts, corn or cotton from their farm trailers and into a warehouse, mill or gin, and then transferring them again to their next resting place. When later I joined the Navy, my fingerprints were so mutilated that I had to fill out a special form indicating that "Manual Labor" was the cause.

Finally, the hamlet of Plains, population 650, loosened its grip and I left for Georgia Tech and the big city of Atlanta. But, in 1968, I placed my college career in abeyance and joined the Navy.

After boot camp and training as an electronics technician I was assigned to the USS Grapple, ARS 7 (Auxiliary Rescue Salvage). Our ship served in Vietnam and returned home, very slowly on only one of four engines, the following year.

A physics degree at Georgia Tech followed and I was able to enter the University of Georgia School of Law in 1972.

1975 marked my entry into the Georgia Bar Association and the official beginning of Dad's run for the Presidency. In that campaign, I traveled widely across the United States, organizing in rural counties, shaking hands in shopping centers, giving interviews, and, most importantly, listening to people concerned about their government.

As I traveled the country, listening to strangers, staying the night in supporters' houses, I was struck by how informed, intelligent, and idealistic the people were. It was rare to find anyone who wanted anything from me or my father other than honesty and good government.

That experience left me a changed man, wiser, optimistic about America's future, and ready to rely on the "will of the People".

After a short stint in a three-person law firm in north Georgia, I discovered an attraction to business. So, in the fall of 1977, I unloaded the first load of soybeans into my new grain elevator. I became fascinated by the art of hedging - the use of futures markets to protect profit margins. Because I understood those principles, I was able to offer a wide range of pricing programs to my customers.

My interest in futures markets led me to the Chicago Board of Trade after Dad left office, then to the currency markets with Citibank. The 1980's steamed into the 1990's with a blur of buys and sells, highs and lows, economic indicators and early mornings, until a day in early 1992 on a trip to visit clients in Cleveland, OH, when I met Elizabeth Sawyer, a Southern Belle from the Mississippi Delta.

She swept me off my feet, and we got married three months later.

Our lives in the financial arena led us to Bermuda, where we started our own business together. In it, we introduced hedge funds to insurance companies, banks, investment companies and family offices. We do essentially the same thing in Nevada now.

We have four children from previous marriages who are scattered across the country. John is a film director in Los Angeles; Jason is a lawyer in Atlanta, married to Kate, a journalist; Sarah E. is a painter in New York City; and Sarah R. studies neuroscience in a PhD program in San Francisco with her husband, Brendan.

In the course of my life, I have never been a professional politician. But I have worked with my hands, enlisted in the Navy, won degrees in science and law, earned a living in agribusiness and the rough and tumble commodities markets, studied economics and international business, lived abroad, and started a small business with my wife and partner, Elizabeth. I've had good days and bad days, made mistakes along with some very good decisions, lived in many places, met a lot of people and especially enjoyed our children.

I've discovered that the American Dream is alive and well, percolating in a million ways all over the United States and outside of it wherever Americans live.

After the Power of God, I know that American ideals of Freedom, Justice, Democracy and Free Enterprise are the strongest societal forces in the world. Our own example is spreading them across the globe.

And I've learned that the American People know more than I do. You are a constant source of wisdom, energy and new ideas from which I drink as often and deeply as possible.

Elizabeth and I bought a condo in 2001 and moved to Nevada in 2002, expecting great weather, beautiful country, bright lights and interesting people. We found all those things, but we got something extra. We discovered a State which valued Freedom as much as we did, more than in any other place we've lived. That revelation touched our souls with the realization that we were Home. We love Nevada.

I told Elizabeth that we've been Nevadans all our lives; we just figured it out a few years ago.