![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Screenshot-75-5-png.webp?resize=362%2C185&ssl=1\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\u201cWatching his family and I wouldn\u2019t have recognized them because we\u2019ve all gotten 40-45 years older,\u201d he said. \u201cThinking back to interactions that I had with them and thinking back to the little times of personal interaction that I had with President Carter and candidate-Carter.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gillen said law enforcement came easy to him since his father was an NYPD detective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He served as a Secret Service agent from 1975 \u2013 1982 and retired from the Lakeland Police Department in 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
President Carter\u2019s daughter, Amy, was nine years old when Gillen protected her at school.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cSaturday Night Live used to do skits about us \u2013 the big agents sitting in the back classroom with all the little kids, all the 9 year olds,\u201d said Gillen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the space he says Secret Service agents call the \u201cI love me room\u201d, Gillen has a signed picture of Amy Carter and a few from her father, the 39th president.<\/p>\n\n\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/summit.webp?resize=876%2C492&ssl=1\")
<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\u201cTo Jack Gillen, US Secret Service, best wishes, Jimmy Carter,\u201d reads Gillen from one of the signed photos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gillen has a certificate from his detail at the famous \u201cCamp David Summit,\u201d when President Carter met with the leaders of Egypt and Israel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBeing at an event like that was very historic,\u201d said Gillen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gillen said it was stressful working for the Service Service, a 24\/7 zero fail mission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere was always the threat of kidnapping. That\u2019s why you could not let a foreign government kidnap a family member of the United States president,\u201d said Gillen. \u201cA lot of times the Secret Service makes it look easy but it\u2019s not easy. It\u2019s extremely stressful.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gillen remembers back to when he was on Carter\u2019s detail before his election, when he was still a presidential candidate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI was standing in front of his room, standing post as we say and he opened the door and he said, \u2018Agent, come on in. I have something for you guys.\u2019 And he had two big fruit trays,\u201d said Gillen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Gillen said what he remembers most is Carter\u2019s faith.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sundays were often spent at First Baptist Church, where Gillen would listen closely to Carter\u2019s Sunday school lectures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI don\u2019t think he ever changed from governor of Georgia to former president of the United States,\u201d said Gillen. \u201cLooking back on President Carter\u2019s life and the things he accomplished after his presidency, they\u2019re pretty amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While he cannot attend, Gillen said the Carter family invited all agents who served on Carter\u2019s detail throughout the years to his funeral Thursday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
While watching coverage of President Jimmy Carter\u2019s remembrances, retired Secret Service agent Jack Gillen sees familiar faces. \u201cWatching his family and I wouldn\u2019t have recognized them because we\u2019ve all gotten… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53205,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"12","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDFcL1NjcmVlbnNob3QtNzUtNS1wbmcud2VicD9maXQ9MzYyJTJDMTg1JnNzbD0xIiwidHh0IjoiTGFrZWxhbmQgbWFuIHJlY2FsbHMgd29ya2luZyBQcmVzaWRlbnQgQ2FydGVyXHUyMDE5cyBkZXRhaWwgYXMgYSBTZWNyZXQgU2VydmljZSBhZ2VudCIsInRlbXBsYXRlIjoiaGlnaHdheSIsImJsb2dfaWQiOjE2MzA0MDY2MX0.xzbzuilhbYMT9EguQynYFzhM53G2WR9qXILY45kW-x8MQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":53205,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Screenshot-75-5-png.webp","type":"image\/png"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[12,14],"tags":[10722],"class_list":["post-53204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local","category-news","tag-lakeland-man-recalls-working-president-carters-detail-as-a-secret-service-agent"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53204"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53207,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53204\/revisions\/53207"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}