She and Rosalynn Carter worked to establish a nonprofit organization, Every Child By Two (now called Vaccinate Your Family), to increase education efforts concerning vaccine-preventable illnesses.
She was an advocate for childhood immunizations and for limiting nuclear arms proliferation.
She grew up on a farm that had no electricity for years. She later lived in Ames, Iowa, and attended Iowa State University, a fine arts institute in Chicago, and the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville.