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Beulah George "Georgia" Tann (July 18, 1891 – September 15, 1950), was an American social worker and child trafficker who operated the Tennessee Children's Home Society, an unlicensed adoption agency in Memphis, Tennessee. Tann used the home as a front for her black market baby adoption scheme from the 1920s to 1950. Young children were kidnapped and then sold to wealthy families, abused, or—in some instances—murdered. A state investigation into numerous instances of adoption fraud led to the closure of the institution in 1950. Tann died of cancer before the investigation made its findings public. Early life and education Tann was born on July 18, 1891, in Philadelphia, Mississippi, to Beulah Isabella (née Yates) and George Clark Tann. She was older than her brother, Rob Roy Tann, by three years. Young Beulah was a school teacher during a time when it was uncommon for women to work outside of the home. Her father, Judge George Tann, reportedly had a "domineering" personality. He also had aspirations of his daughter becoming a concert pianist, and, beginning at the age of five, he put her in piano lessons that continued into adulthood. Nelli Kenyon with The Nashville Tennessean reported that Tann's childhood home in Hickory, Mississippi, was a popular neighborhood gathering spot. Judge Tann would sometimes bring abandoned or neglected children with him, remarking that he would need a minister, school teacher, and doctor to figure out what to do with the children. Tann attended Martha Washington College in Abingdon, Virginia, graduating with a degree in music in 1913, and took courses in social work at Columbia University in New York for two summers. However, she despised playing piano and, instead, desired to become a lawyer as her father had been. Under his tutelage, she read the law and passed the state bar exam in Mississippi. However, her father did not want her to practice law because it was unusual for women. With no apparent desire to get married or have children, she availed herself of one of the few careers available to unmarried women of her time, social work. Career Upon graduation, she briefly worked in Texas as a social worker, but quit after a short time. Mississippi Children's Home Society Tann found employment at the Mississippi Children's Home Society, working as the Receiving Director at the Kate McWillie Powers Receiving Home for Children. Ann Atwood, the daughter of a family friend, also worked at the home as a housemother; Ann was eight years Tann's junior. She had recently given birth to a son out of wedlock, and around this time appended Hollinsworth to her name, likely to give the impression that she had actually been widowed. It is unclear when they became a couple, but when Tann was terminated because of her questionable child-placing methods in 1924, she moved to Memphis, Tennessee with Atwood, Atwood's infant son, Jack, and her own adopted daughter, June. Tennessee Children's Home Society In Memphis, Tann was hired as the Executive Secretary at the Shelby County branch of the Tennessee Children's Home Society. Its offices were located on the fifth floor of the Goodwyn Building downtown. The society was the largest in the state, and had branches in Jackson, Knoxville, and Chattanooga. Tann used aggressive tactics to eventually take over the organization. In 1924, Tann began trafficking children. While Tennessee law permitted agencies to place children with appropriate applicants, in an effort to ban the selling of children, agencies could charge only for their services. In keeping with the law, the society charged about seven dollars for adoptions within Tennessee. However, Tann also arranged for out-of-state, private adoptions for which she charged a premium. As many as 80 percent of these adoptions were to parents in New York and California. Adoptions in states such as Mississippi, Arkansas, and Missouri could be arranged for $750. Records indicate that between 1940 and 1950, the agency placed 3,000 children in just those two states. "at a time when adoptions in Tennessee cost the princely sum of $7, some adoptions brokered by Tann cost as much as $5,000" Alma Walton and Regina Warner both worked for Tann, and made a trip every three weeks with four to six babies in tow: Walton to California and Warner to New York. They would rent hotel rooms where they would meet with prospective adoptive parents, most of whom were wealthy. Each couple would pay US$700 in a check made out to "Georgia Tann." Additionally, Tann might charge prospective parents for background checks she had never pursued, air travel costs at exorbitant rates, and adoption paperwork at five times the actual cost. The state of Tennessee itself was contributing US$61,000 a year to the agency, with 31 percent of that money going towards the Memphis branch. Profits were kept in a secret bank account under a false corporation name at the time. It is alleged that she pocketed 80 to 90 percent of the fees from these adoptions for her own personal use. She also failed to report the income to either the Society's board or the Internal Revenue Service. In a 1979 interview with the Los Angeles Times, Tennessee special prosecutor Robert Taylor reported that 1,200 children were adopted out of the home between 1944 and 1950, but only a few of them remained with Tennessee families. Notable personalities who used Tann's services included actress Joan Crawford (twin daughters, Cathy and Cynthia were adopted through the agency while daughter Christina Crawford and son Christopher were adopted through other agencies). June Allyson and husband Dick Powell also used the Memphis-based home for adopting a child, as did the adoptive parents of professional wrestler Ric Flair. New York Governor Herbert Lehman, who signed a law sealing birth certificates from New York adoptees in 1935, also adopted a child through the agency. Tann used a variety of methods to procure children. Through pressure tactics, threats of legal action, and other ways, she would dupe or coerce birth parents, mostly poor single mothers, to turn the children over to her custody, often under false pretenses. Alma Sipple, one of Tann's victims, described her as "a stern-looking woman with close-cropped grey hair, round wireless glasses and an air of utter authority." Tann also arranged for the taking of children born to inmates at Tennessee mental institutions and those born to wards of the state through her connections. To meet demand, she resorted to kidnappings. In a 1937 governmental report by Emma Annie Winslow, a prominent American home economist and researcher, she reported that the three homes for unwed mothers in Memphis, in cooperation with the local health department, had committed to keeping mothers with their infants for at least three months before seeking adoption, especially to complete breastfeeding. However, all three homes reported that, in practice, the Tennessee Children's Home would collect the child.... Discover the Barbara Bisantz Raymond popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Barbara Bisantz Raymond books.