George Lyon Pauk M.D.
George Pauk resides in Phoenix, Arizona. He retired from the Indian Health Service work as a physician consultant in diabetes health care, program administration, research and care for tribes in Arizona, Utah and Nevada. He is active in Phoenix community programs such as Head Start and immigration and health care reform. In recent years he and wife Jane have lived on their boat located on the New York Erie Canal for four to five months each year.
He was born in Binghamton, New York in 1936. He received a medical degree from the University of Iowa, and postdoctoral training was in Panama Canal Zone, the University of Iowa, and Harvard Medical School. His career experience includes research and practice of Internal Medicine and Endocrinology, and teaching medical students and nurse practitioners. He has served in positions on the staff of the University of Maine, the University of Texas, and the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Primary health care programs relating to organizations for low-income people, human rights, education and prevention programs for hypertension and diabetes, and clinics in Nicaragua have been a focus of his work. He is active with Physicians for a National Health Program, and other organizations.
While living 17 years in Maine, he developed a project that educated children and adults about various trees and tree planting. Now, in New York State, he has volunteered and developed the issue of restoring native trees, such as White Oaks, where they have been depleted by special use in industry such as barge and ship building, barrel construction, canal building, etc. A project has developed to distribute and plant trees and promote knowledge of issues such as the value of acorns and native diversity of the forest to the ecology of the area. In 2017 a very successful inclusion of White Oak and White Pine trees on the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum barge, the Lois McClure, was met with enthusiasm in over thirty ports along the canals. Follow up distribution and planting of trees is being planned to make significant restoration.
