After Carter graduated from the Naval Academy, he was assigned to the U.S.S. Wyoming and then the U.S.S. Mississippi. In July 1947, he transferred to the navy’s submarine unit, working on the U.S.S. Pomfret in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. When the Korean War began, Carter received another submarine ship assignment aboard the U.S.S. K-1. He then worked under the direction of Admiral Hyman Rickover, who was in charge of the navy’s nuclear submarine program. He also studied nuclear physics at Union College in New York. In 1998, he received the ultimate honor for a veteran when a U.S. Navy submarine was named after him.