Elizabeth "Becky" Lane Hanna

Elizabeth “Becky” Lane Hanna, age 82, of Gulfport, passed away on Sunday, September 27, 2026.

Becky was born on April 24, 1944, in Wiggins, MS. She graduated from Wiggins High School. She also obtained a BS Degree in Education from The University of Mississippi and a master’s degree in special education from the University of Alabama. Becky also took summer enrichment courses in Architecture at Trinity College of Oxford University and at Cambridge University, both located in England.

She was chosen as Miss Hospitality in Wiggins and competed in the 1964 Miss Hospitality pageant in Biloxi. She was also chosen as Mardi Gras Queen in Wiggins. Becky taught high school in Gulfport, Atlanta, and retired after teaching for 26 years in the Fairfax County School Systems in Virginia.

Becky loved to travel and Paris was her favorite city. She made many trips to Europe, including a summer of hopping from country to country via Eurail passes. The most important accomplishment of Becky’s life was the enduring friendships that she made, which included her circle of high school friends from Wiggins that still meet monthly for lunch; her friends from the Washington, D.C. area that referred to themselves at “The Magnolias” and gather once a year at one of their houses or a destination city for a week of fun and fellowship; her many friends from the Gulfport Yacht Club, the Civic League, the Professional Educators Organization (PEO), the Great Southern Dinner Club, the Gulf Coast Symphony Guild, and the “Challengers” Sunday school class. Then there were individual close friendships, too numerous to mention them all, some lasting more that 50 years, like Deeb, Linda, and Warrene.

Becky was preceded in death by her parents, Elizabeth M. Dorsett Lane and John Milson Lane; brother, John Dorsett Lane; and children, George Hanna and David Hanna.

Survivors include her husband, Hugh B. Hanna, Jr.; children, Balsorah Lynch of Richmond, VA and Richard Hanna of Gulfport, MS; grandchildren, Jacob Lynch of Richmond, VA, Burgundy Hanna of Ft. Collins, CO, Joseph Hanna of Gulfport, MS, and Sophie Rose Hanna of Brighton/Hove, UK. 

A funeral service will be held at 11:00 a.m. on Saturday, October 3, 2026, at First United Methodist Church in Gulfport. Friends may visit beginning at 10:00 a.m. Interment will follow the service at Woodlawn Park Cemetery in Wiggins.

The family asks that memorial contributions be made to Alzheimer's Association at donorservices.alz.org or to your favorite charity.

Bradford-O’Keefe Funeral Home, 15th Street, Gulfport is honored to serve the family of Elizabeth “Becky” Lane Hanna.