Georgia Ann Gilley was born October 1, 1934, the daughter of George E. Harmes and Myrtle V. (Breckenridge) Harmes of Fairfax, Missouri. She attended Irish Grove school until it consolidated with Fairfax, graduating from Fairfax High School in 1951. Georgia attended NWMSC at Maryville, Missouri, receiving a degree in music education in 1954. She furthered her education at the University of Nebraska, receiving her master’s degree in 1956.

In December of 1955, Georgia married Jimmy Lynn Gilley from Oakdale, California. The couple lived in Callaway, Nebraska, Nehawka, Nebraska, and Hastings, Nebraska. She was a music instructor in those schools. The couple retired in Fort Myers, Florida, in 1986, but moved back to the family farm in 2004.

In Hastings, Georgia did volunteer work with Community Concerts, Adams County YWCA, and the Mary Lanning Hospital Auxiliary. In Florida, she enjoyed playing cello with the Southwest Florida Symphony, the Gulf Coast Symphony, and the Port Charlotte Symphony. She also played with a quartet and a small string ensemble. Her husband sang with a barbershop quartet and when not busy with musical connections, the couple enjoyed traveling in their motorhome visiting the family farm and most of the United States. The couple moved back to Fairfax in 2003 to the family farm where Georgia enjoyed pitch, book club, Sorosis, gardening, and gossiping with old friends.

Georgia passed away Tuesday, February 22, 2022, in Lincoln, Nebraska, after a brief illness. She was preceded in death by her husband, and is survived by her son, James Edward Gilley, of rural Baldwin City, Kansas.