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Rosalynn Carter, the mild-mannered but determined wife of former President Jimmy Carter who worked tirelessly on behalf of mental health reform and professionalized the role of the president’s spouse, died Sunday at the age of 96. She died with family at her home in Plains, Georgia, the small town where she and Jimmy were born and raised, according to the Carter Center.

A few weeks ago, the Carter family revealed that the former first lady had been diagnosed with dementia. She began receiving home hospice care in February, following a series of hospital stays. She has been in the hospital numerous times over the past year, including for a severe case of pneumonia in January and a recent hip fracture from a fall. Her husband, who turned 99 in October, also is undergoing home hospice care, having begun his treatment in February.

The couple was married for 77 years, through the rise of their political career from rural Georgia to the White House and beyond. Following Jimmy’s loss in the 1980 presidential election, they opened The Carter Center in Atlanta, an international organization that seeks to promote human rights worldwide.

As first lady, Rosalynn Carter focused on various issues, including childhood immunizations and reducing stigma around mental illness. She also served as a foreign emissary to some Latin American countries. She sat in on cabinet meetings, which sometimes raised eyebrows in Washington power circles, but she took a hands-on approach to her work as the country’s top woman. “She was a good team player, and she knew what her role was,” one of her aides once said.

Once back in Plains, she continued her efforts to reduce stigma and push multiple U.S. administrations to dedicate resources to mental health programs. She was also known for her steadfast commitment to her husband’s political career, frequently traveling on her own to campaign with him in small towns across the United States, where she picked up the nickname of the “Steel Magnolia.”

During the early stages of her husband’s campaigns in the 1970s, she often traveled to places where she didn’t know anyone to ask voters why they should support her husband’s candidacy. “When you hear someone tell their story, it reaches deep inside and makes your heart feel like it has been touched,” she once said.

Jason Carter, the couple’s grandson and chairman of the Carter Center’s governing board, told PEOPLE in September that his grandparents have been enjoying their last chapter together, spending springs at their home in Plains and summers visiting loved ones. “That word love defines certainly their relationship, but also their way of approaching the world,” he said. “And they’re living that in their daily lives.” Click for more on the life of Rosalynn Carter.