You can’t choose where you’re born. You can, however, decide whether to come home again as an adult. About 35 years after she was born to Russellville parents, Dr. Jenny Brown-Todd decided that Russellville/Logan County is where she wanted to open her own veterinary practice.
In early 2014, she learned that the former office of Dr. Jim Chambers in downtown Russellville was closed. She made the decision to purchase the practice and to modernize the office in a wide variety of aspects, including up-to-date surgical and dental equipment.
This Friday the Logan Chamber will help Brown Animal Hospital, located on 153 S. Summer Street in Russellville, celebrate its first anniversary from 12 to 2 p.m. Along with the grand re-opening there will also be a fundraiser for Heaven Can Wait Animal Rescue. There will be a raffle and prizes along with a cookout and bake sale.
An art exhibit featuring the work of legendary local artist Brenda Brown will be on display. Any time a patron enters the office, though, there’s a chance from five to ten of Brown’s paintings will be adorning the walls of the lobby and in examination rooms. Dr. Brown-Todd has a monopoly on those works. Brenda Brown is her mom.
Jenny is the daughter of two retired educators, Brenda and Larry Brown. Her dad was a college basketball player and was a coach at Russellville High School. He taught math and physics at RHS, Logan County High School and Franklin-Simpson High School. Brenda Brown built successful art programs and Stevenson Elementary School and RHS.
It’s logical that Jenny Brown would become an excellent point guard for the Lady Panthers during her high school years, given her dad’s interest in the sport.
Now she’s even more part of the basketball scene, since her husband is Phil Todd, a former Panther and Austin Peay State University great who is one of the most successful coaches ever in this area. They married last August.
The love of animals also runs in Dr. Brown-Todd’s blood. She grew up on a Franklin Road farm with lots of livestock. Not only do her parents still live there, but she and Phil make their home on the farm that was originally purchased by her late grandparents, Ben and Mildrege Brown.
While she was doing her undergraduate work at Murray State University, Jenny was a competitive horse rider, competing in barrels and other rodeo events.
After earning her bachelor’s degree in pre-veterinary studies with a minor in chemistry, she studied microscopy at Western Kentucky University before entering Auburn University School of Veterinary Medicine in Alabama. Five years later she was Dr. Brown.
Along the way she gained a wide array of experiences with animal care, including an externship at the University of California-Davis where she worked with dairy cattle reproduction. During a two-month stint in San Antonio, Texas, she not only worked with horses at a racetrack, but she also had her first experience with vaccines to treat rattlesnake bites. She also had to learn how to treat animals which had come into contact with porcupine quills.
She returned closer to home to work at a mixed animal practice in Columbia, Tenn. for a year and was on-call at two animal hospitals as well.
Then in 2009 she bought a house in Goodlettsville, Tenn., not far from the area where the Brown family—including uncles and aunts Albert and Linda Brown and Alfred and Melba Brown--had lived before relocating to Kentucky. She worked with referral hospitals for animals there and gained experience working with advanced illnesses and diagnostics.
During the five years before she opened her own practice in Russellville, she spent five years as the associate veterinarian at Berry Hill Animal Hospital on Eighth Avenue in the Melrose Section of Nashville. “I was the only surgeon and I loved being there,” she says. “It was hard for me to leave that practice, but the opportunity to come home was too exciting to resist.”
Her friend Ashley Rutherford came with her as office manager and receptionist. She handles the financial aspects of the hospital in addition to scheduling appointments. Dr. Brown-Todd also hired Olmstead native Chelsea Motsinger and Todd Countians Phillip Greenfield to assist her.
In addition to working with animals which need medical attention, the staff at Brown Animal Hospital also provides boarding for animals and routine checkups and dental work.
Brown Animal Hospital is open from 8 a.m.-5 p.m. Mondays through Fridays. When it is closed, Crocker Animal Hospital on Main Street in Franklin serves as a backup.