G. Robert Carter, former Lowndes County commissioner and sheriff, passed away at his home Saturday after a brief illness.

Carter, 86, served as Lowndes County Sheriff for many years before serving as Lowndes County commissioner for the last ten. He did not seek re-election this term, and Crawford Powell was elected as his successor from the Lake Park area.

“It’s just a great loss to the community and it’s a personal loss to me because I’ll miss his knowledge and his experience and his mentoring,” Powell said. “He was the epitome of a true public servant.”

Growing close with Carter over the years, he provided a safety net to Powell as he took his seat as Lowndes County commissioner in January.

“He was there available for me to call if I needed anything and that’s a nice feeling to have that safety net,” Powell said. “I’ll miss him as will many, many, many people. He’s just one of those guys, he just really cared about people.”

Lowndes County Chairman Ashley Paulk had known Carter since high school, and said he and Lowndes County are going to miss him.

“He was a wonderful person and a great friend,” Paulk said. “Anything he did he did for the good of the people and, most of all, he was a great friend to me and I’ll miss him.”

Lowndes County Manager Joe Pritchard is fortunate to have worked with Carter and said he was “kind of like a father to all of us.

“I’ve said several times he was a real mentor and a father figure to all the employees and especially to me,” he said. “He served his community … He was kind of like a father to all of us and we just felt like he was family and he felt that way about us.”

Carter was elected to the commission in 2000 and began his term in January 2001.

He initially ran for a four-year term, and then the commissioners decided to stagger the terms, so he ran for and served a two-year term and then ran again for a four-year term, which ended in December 2010.

The county commission wasn’t Carter’s first brush with the political arena, as he also served as Lowndes County sheriff from 1975 to 1992.

Carter was the assistant police chief in Valdosta when he ran for sheriff.

Carter was born on July 8, 1924, in Perry, Fla., and moved to Naylor with his parents when he was six months old.

The oldest of three brothers, he graduated from Naylor High School as the class valedictorian in 1941, and received a small scholarship to the University of Georgia but decided to stay in Clyattville and farm instead.

He was drafted in 1944, the same year he married his high school sweetheart, Katie Ruth Sego Carter. Carter served with the American Infantry Division in the Philippine Islands during World War II. He was also stationed in Yokohama, Japan, with the 519th MP Battalion Occupational Forces until the end of the war.

After the war, Carter went back to farming. He said his tobacco crop did very poorly one year. He had heard the Valdosta Police Department was paying $200 a month, so he applied. Police Chief Wilbur Perkerson hired him on Aug. 7, 1952, at $175 per month. He said it took him six months before he started earning the full $200. He graduated from the FBI Academy under the bureau’s longtime founding director, J. Edgar Hoover.

Carter served with the Valdosta Police Department until he was elected Lowndes County sheriff in April of 1975. He was reelected in 1976, 1980, 1984, and 1988.

Carter served on the State Board of Corrections for 12 years, eight under Gov. Joe Frank Harris and four under Zell Miller. Much was accomplished during Carter’s time on the county commission.

Completing the Unified Land Development Regulations, enlarging the Lowndes County Jail, funding and beginning construction on the Emergency Operations Center and the new courthouse and administrative wing are a few projects he said he was pleased to have had a hand in.

Carter lived in Clyattville on the 114-acre farm he inherited from his parents. He lost his wife of 65 years this past April. Together, they  raised three daughters, Jayne Carter, June Ricks, and Nancy Ellington,  and had eight grandchildren and 17 great-grandchildren.