Ida C. Hudson was remembered as a woman with a “strong commitment to the community.”

Hudson, who carried on the charitable legacy of her father, Fuller E. Callaway Jr., died early Tuesday at West Georgia Medical Center. She was 74.

She had served on the boards of the Fuller E. Callaway Foundation for more than 30 years and the Callaway Foundation for 20 years, displaying a particular fondness for children with special needs.

She recently had been diagnosed with cancer and went into treatment with “a great spirit and a great attitude, and with tremendous support from her family,” said her pastor, the Rev. Paul Baxter of First Baptist Church on the Square.

“I’ve never seen her more upbeat and positive than she was most recently,” Baxter said. “She faced her last illness with great faith, courage and optimism,” but the chemotherapy “devastated her” and she developed a severe infection that caused her death in the intensive-care unit.

Hudson was president of Charitable Services Co., which manages both Callaway foundations.

“She was a very private person, best known by her family and closest friends,” said Speer Burdette, president of the foundations. “She didn’t really get out a lot, but she had a very strong commitment to the community and she wanted to continue” her father’s charitable efforts.

“She will be missed by all of us,” Burdette said. “There’s going to be a real void.”

County historian Clark Johnson, a longtime friend who served with Hudson for six years on the board of Hills and Dales, said she was a quiet and private person with “an active interest in others that extended from her family to the whole community.”

“Everyone who knew her loved her gaiety and tremendous sense of fun,” Johnson said. “A great number of people will not even know the debt they owe her because she so often worked in the background, but a lot of what makes LaGrange such a wonderful place is due to her contributions.”

Joel Martin can be reached at jmartin@lagrangenews.com or (706) 884-7311, Ext. 235.