Elvis impersonator George Wagner dies

The Canton Repository Feature Today on George Wagner

Wednesday, August 8, 2007
BY Dan Kane
REPOSITORY ENTERTAINMENT EDITOR

WAGNER DIES George Wagner, who conveyed the Presley persona onstage and off, was found dead in his Pike Township home Monday night. Repository file

George Wagner wasn’t a guy who’d glue on a black pompadour wig and sideburns at showtime.

His Elvis impersonation went deeper. From his eye-catching hairdo to his Southern accent and gentlemanly charm, Wagner conveyed the Presley persona onstage and off.

“It’s like he was born to play the part,” said Sue Jeske, office manager of ESPN Radio 990, which hired Wagner to do his Elvis show four years running at downtown Massillon’s Cruise-On-In and Dance Party.

Wagner, 44, was found dead Monday night at his home on Overlook Drive SW in Pike Township.

His death is being investigated as a possible prescription-drug overdose, said Harry Campbell, chief investigator for the Stark County Coroner’s office.

“There were a lot of medications at the scene,” Campbell said. Investigators found no evidence of foul play.

Wagner had spoken with a neighbor Friday morning, Campbell said, and it appears he had been dead since shortly thereafter. There were 16 cats in the home, Campbell said.

WEEKLY SHOWS AT MOUNTAINEER

At the Mountaineer Gaming Resort in Chester, W.Va., Wagner had built a loyal following with his weekly shows.

“He was absolutely loved by our patrons down here,” Tamara Cronin, Mountaineer’s director of public relations, said Tuesday. “He performed here on Monday nights for years. We had groups of people who’d come in for the express purpose of seeing and hearing George. He certainly drew crowds in.”

Wagner’s wife, Linda Moffet Wagner, died of cancer on July 15, 2005.

“He loved his wife dearly. She kept his life in order,” Jeske said. “He personally said, ‘I don’t know how I’m going to make it without her.’ ”

Jeske said the last time she saw Wagner — when he performed at the Cruise-On-In party in June 2006 — “he looked good. He was laughing and smiling. He looked like life had come back into him again.”

Wagner “was down here a couple of weeks ago. He seemed fine,” said Warren resident David Jones, Linda Wagner’s son. Wagner’s funeral arrangements will be handled by Roberts-Clark Chapel in Warren, he said.

A native of Foscoe, N.C., George Wagner moved to Canton in 1993. He met his wife after her name and Canton address appeared in a newsletter for Presley fans. He wrote her a letter, they began corresponding and then chatting on the phone. After three years, he persuaded her to fly down to North Carolina and meet him. They married in Canton in August 1994.

CAREER PROSPERED AFTER MOVE HERE

George Wagner has an adult son, Josh, who lives in Boone, N.C.

“When I moved to Canton, things really began taking off,” Wagner said in a 2002 Repository interview. A good-humored and sincere guy, he talked about overzealous female fans — in Vegas “they call them ‘sideburn chasers,’ ” he said — and expressed discomfort at being compared to Presley.

“There will never be another Elvis Presley,” he said with reverence. “I just want to give people back the music and let them relive it through me.”

In 2002, Wagner placed second out of 42 contestants at the King of Contests, a national Elvis impersonator showdown held in Las Vegas. In June, he won an Ultimate Elvis Extravaganza Impersonator Contest in Bryant, Ind.

A fan to the end, Wagner was wearing Elvis pajamas when he died.

Wagner’s singing can be sampled online at:

www.myspace.com.gwagner