George West is the county seat of Live Oak County, Texas, a small city set in the brush country of South Texas along Interstate 37 and U.S. Route 59. The city is named for George Washington West, a cattle rancher who donated land and helped establish the community in the early twentieth century. Ranching and agriculture were the area's original economic foundation, and oil and gas production joined them beginning in the 1920s, giving the region a diversified rural economy that endures today. The city is positioned roughly midway between San Antonio and Corpus Christi, which has long made it a crossroads and a convenient stopping point along the interstate. Its location in the heart of South Texas's hunting country, midway between Choke Canyon Reservoir and Lake Corpus Christi, has also made it a base for outdoor recreation, with hunting and fishing among the most popular regional pastimes. George West is perhaps best known for storytelling. The Texas Senate designated the city the "Storytelling Capital of Texas" in 2005, a recognition of the George West Storyfest, a long-running festival that brought professional storytellers to the community and into local schools to promote literacy and preserve the oral tradition. That identity remains a point of local pride. Today George West is a quiet, close-knit county seat of roughly 2,200 residents. County government, the school district, ranching, and the energy industry anchor local employment, and the town's small downtown serves surrounding ranches and farms. For residents, it offers a slow-paced rural lifestyle with the conveniences of the interstate corridor and the larger cities of the Coastal Bend and South Texas within a reasonable drive. Families are drawn by the small schools, the wide-open landscape, and the access to lakes and hunting land that define this corner of Live Oak County.