By Cara Cowan Watts | Cherokee 411
August 14, 2026 — June 20, 2026
The Woodlands, Texas
Cherokee Nation Citizen
George Olen Wood, 72, of The Woodlands, Texas, passed away on June 20, 2026, in Conroe, Texas.
Born on August 14, 1953, to Hollis and Carnie (Crow) Wood, George was a proud At-Large citizen of
the Cherokee Nation who always filled his loved ones’ lives with music and laughter.
Raised in Longview, Texas, George enjoyed spending his childhood summers with his family at his Aunt Sadie’s house in Sallisaw, Oklahoma. He always said that Sallisaw was the only place that truly felt like home. When he was 15, George’s mother purchased him a guitar, which he named Lucille.
This marked the beginning of a lifelong passion for music, and led to him learning to play many other instruments including the keyboard and bass guitar. He quickly discovered that he could turn this passion into a paycheck, playing in numerous bands while attending Pine Tree High School.
He went on to continue his career in music by touring the country with multiple bands before returning to his hometown, where he played in the house band as an official Reo Rambler at the historic Reo Palm Isle Dance Hall. During this time, he performed with many well-known musicians, including Hank Williams, Ronnie Milsap, The Judds, and many others. As a musician, George was quite a character and eventually earned the nickname “J.T.,” short for “Jive Turkey.” He was known as J.T. throughout his music career, with some of his closest friends never knowing that his real name was George.
In 1985, his daughter Sarah was born, and his life changed forever. Wanting to build a better life for her, he enrolled in the nursing program at Kilgore College. He became a Registered Nurse in 1992 and spent the majority of his career at the University of Texas Health Center in Tyler, retiring from nursing in 2015. While nursing was never his true passion, he excelled in the profession and spent many of his nursing years as a charge nurse on his home unit, 6 East, where he cared for countless patients with tuberculosis, cystic fibrosis, and other pulmonary illnesses. He raised Sarah as a single father, creating a childhood filled with music, laughter, and mischief, a childhood that always felt like
a great adventure.
George was promoted to the title of “Pawpaw” when his granddaughters, Eleanor and Marjorie, were born in 2011 and 2016, respectively. From then on, weekends and holidays were spent in The Woodlands with the family who loved him dearly. In 2020, he made the decision to leave Longview for good and move to The Woodlands permanently to be closer to his girls.
In 2005, George faced his first battle with lung cancer. After a lobectomy, radiation, and
chemotherapy, he remained cancer-free for 15 years until his second battle with lung cancer in 2020. Following another surgery, he was in remission for three years before receiving the news that the cancer had returned for a third time. George went on to bravely battle his Stage IV lung cancer for another three years.
George was preceded in death by his parents, Hollis Berle Wood and Carnie Marie (Crow) Wood. He is survived by his daughter, Sarah; his son-in-law, Casey Page; his granddaughters, Eleanor and Marjorie; his sister, Patti Haskins, and her husband, Clayton; his brother, Hollis Wood, and his wife, Jeanne; and several nieces and nephews.
George’s legacy of love and passion for music lives on in his granddaughters. He will always be greatly missed by all who had the precious opportunity to know and love him.
