Beatrice Lang collection

Bebe Lang was born at Satilla Bluff in Camden County, Georgia, March 23, 1903. She was the daughter of Rufus Sumner Lang and Beatrice Gertrude Dufour Lang. The Lang and Dufour families were among the early families of Camden County. Beatrice Dufour Lang was descended from Louis Dufour, who came to Camden County in 1801, and married Maria Ponce of East Florida. Her parents were John and Julia Gertude Caulder Dufour. Mr. Lang was a timber man and merchant at Satilla Bluff. After his death, in 1912, the family moved to Woodbine, upstream from Satilla Bluff, now a dead town. Miss Lang’s first business venture was the ownership of a service station in Woodbine on today’s site of the Woodbine City Hall. She operated this until World War II, when she moved to Jacksonville and worked in Civil Service. After returning to Woodbine in 1947 to care for her invalid mother, she became Camden County’s registrar and justice of the peace. As a member of the original Camden County Historical Commission, she was instrumental in securing the help of Mary Givens Bryan, head of the State Archives, and the Church of Latter Day Saints in preserving county records. In this period, county and some older church records were microfilmed, laminated, and bound. Other projects included filing and boxing loose papers from the courthouse and cataloguing county cemeteries. Upon the conclusion of this work, Miss Lang moved to Atlanta to become the county services coordinator for the Georgia Department of Archives and History. Her responsibilities were acquiring, microfilming, and preserving records from all Georgia counties. After her retirement in 1976, she continued her research and acquisitions until plans could be made for a depository to be established in Woodbine. With the help of county officials, civic organizations, local citizens, and other interested parties, the Bryan-Lang Historical Library was built and opened on November 8, 1987. It was named in honor of Beatrice Lang and Mary Givens Bryan. Miss Bebe died on December 4, 1989 and is buried in the Lang family plot in Oak Grove cemetery in St. Marys, Georgia.