Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, May 28, 1995                   TAG: 9505300090
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SHH! HIS VISIT WAS A SECRET ... REALLY

The hallways and parking lot were teeming with soccer-playing kids from all over the East Coast, in town for the Crestar Festival Soccer Tournament.

And then former President Jimmy Carter rolled in.

"The kids had no idea who he was," said Mike Ware, regional sales manager for Days Inn.

The hotel staff knew, though. Carter's visit wasn't unexpected; it was just a secret.

The peacemaker from Plains, Ga., had peeled off Interstate 81 for the dedication of the inn's new "Jimmy Carter Presidential Suite."

Ware said the inn was remodeling a meeting room into a suite and learned Carter would be passing Roanoke about the time it would be finished. Since Carter has stayed at the inn before, Ware had the idea of naming the suite for him and inviting him to dedicate it.

For the next two years, the inn will donate $2 of the $77 nightly fee for the room to the Roanoke-area Habitat for Humanity. The organization, with which Carter has worked for several years, uses volunteers to build low-cost houses for low-income and homeless families to buy.

Saturday afternoon, Carter; his wife, Rosalyn; his son, Chip; Chip's wife; Chip's child; the child's governess; and seven Secret Service agents pulled into the parking lot in two vans and a car.

Ware said Secret Service agents told him to keep the visit quiet, but the less-than-conspicuous entrance drew the attention of every ball-kicking kid in the hotel.

One 12-year-old recognized Carter, and by the time the entourage emerged from the suite, a crowd of kids and parents had gathered to greet them with applause and dozens of hands to shake.

"You couldn't ask for a nicer guy, really," Ware said. "It was like talking to your neighbor, until he would bring up going to North Korea."

Steven Putnam, 9, a soccer player from Warrenton, tried to get close to the ex-president but was headed off by a wall of dark-suited agents.

"I think I [saw him],'' Putnam said. "I'm pretty sure I did."

In the end, though, Putnam was rather unimpressed. "You wouldn't think it would be such a big deal for an ex-president to come," he said.

Since his first visit in 1977, Carter has been to Roanoke several times. In 1984, he spoke at Roanoke College. In 1985, he stopped on his way back from a vacation in Pennsylvania and stayed at the Days Inn. He also bought some ice cream at Baskin-Robbins.

And in 1990, he was here thanking workers at Precision Fabrics in Vinton for helping make a filter that keeps the Guinea worm out of water supplies in Third World countries.

Ware said Carter was pleased by the suite and especially by the donation to Habitat for Humanity.

And then, almost as quickly as it began, Carter's visit was over.

He did, according to Ware, make one more stop in Roanoke - at McDonald's, for more ice cream.