On Monday, Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin dedicated six new Habitat for Humanity homes in east Birmingham, and he took the opportunity to praise former First Lady Rosalynn Carter, a longtime Habitat activist and volunteer.

“I think it’s fitting that on the day after First Lady Carter passed away, we acknowledge her during a ribbon-cutting of Habitat homes,” Woodfin said.

Mrs. Carter, the wife of former President Jimmy Carter, died on Sunday, Nov. 19. She was 96.

After Carter’s presidency, the couple famously hammered away as volunteers for Habitat for Humanity, including in Alabama, working on homes in Fairfield and Wylam. “They were slinging hammers, up into their 90s,” said Drew Bonner, vice president of operations for the Greater Birmingham Habitat for Humanity chapter.

“They have just been integral to the success and the growth and the ability to serve more families,” Bonner said. “They understand the value of a safe, affordable place to live. That’s what it’s all about for us.”

In 2010, former President Jimmy Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, teamed up to put new doorknobs throughout a new Habitat for Humanity home in Fairfield.

Later that day, the Carters took part in a blessing ceremony and ribbon-cutting to mark the completion of the Wylam Oaks subdivision in Birmingham, also built by Habitat for Humanity.

“They were both stalwarts,” Woodfin said. “They spent a lot of their time going around not just America but the world building Habitat homes.”

The work the Carters did in the Birmingham area in 2010 was part of the 27th annual Jimmy and Rosalynn Carter Work Project, which included the construction of homes across the country.

Many of the homeowners cry when they receive the keys to their new homes, the former president said while he was in Fairfield. Jimmy and Rosalynn always shared the emotion. “We cry with them,” he said.