Rodney Lee Brown, Sr.

Rodney Lee Brown, Sr., born January 19, 1929 to Homer and Alma Brown, passed away Sunday, May 7, 2023. Visitation with the family will be Saturday, May 13 from 3:00 p.m. until-5:00 p.m. at Wilkirson-Hatch-Bailey Funeral Home, 6101 Bosque Blvd., in Waco. Graveside services will be held at a later date.

Born in Spring, Texas, Rodney also lived in Tomball and Brenham, graduating Brenham High School as salutatorian. Wanting to attend the University of Texas but with no clue how to sign up or where to live, he packed up his 1935 Chevy Coupe (with rumble seat) and headed to the Austin campus assuming he could just walk in and attend class. He graduated in 1951 with a degree in Business Administration, with honors. Spending the next two years in the Air Force Auditor General’s office, Rodney was eventually stationed at James Connolly AFB in Waco, where he met, as he said, “this cute Baylor student,” Audrey Anne (Nan) Young, who was his sister’s suitemate. They were married eleven months later, a marriage that lasted for sixty years until Alzheimer’s disease took her away. They called Waco home for the rest of their lives, rearing three children there while investing in church and community.

With Nan having two more years to finish Baylor, Rodney left the Air Force in 1954 as a 1st Lieutenant and joined a small local accounting firm. He received his CPA credential with one of the top five scores in the state that year. In 1959 he became a partner in the firm, which is now known as Pattillo, Brown, & Hill. The firm grew from three professionals to 25 in the 40 years before Rodney retired. He joked that he retired four times during his life: from the CPA firm, as executor of a large estate, raising registered cattle for 20 years, and a final decade working part-time for law firms as an expert forensic accountant. His favorite career was working long days in Texas heat raising cows and building fences.

From childhood, Rodney was famously thrifty and industrious, viewing work as an interesting challenge and a way to be productive. School-age money-making endeavors included raising rabbits, guinea pigs, and bees; hunting rabbits to sell; collecting soda water bottles for two cents each to pay for Saturday movies; cutting meat at the grocery store market; and selling peach trees he grew on the family lawn. His first car was a non-working Model T for which he traded a $10 watch. He fixed up the car, though it would only go uphill in reverse. In high school and college he dug ditches in swampland (where workers were issued a daily can of mosquito repellent), worked night shifts as a roughneck on offshore drilling rigs (because nights paid more), and cleaned construction sites. He got a job as a carpenter’s helper while errand-running on a refinery building site after the head carpenter asked him if he knew how to select tools and lumber without needing to ask. Because the job meant a 10 cent per hour raise, Rodney answered, “Yes sir!” even though he knew nothing about carpentry. He learned. He continued to learn even in retirement–anything from vaccinating cows to building a farmhouse by himself to editing digital pictures. He continued to go to the law office until age 90.

Rodney enjoyed hunting, fishing, working at his farms, cattle-raising, beekeeping, and travel. An avid hunter from childhood to retirement (when he switched to shooting with a camera), his rule was, “You eat what you kill.” That included lots of venison, wild turkey, quail, dove, and elk. It also included rattlesnake, but only once before they were exempted. Hunting with bow and arrow, which he did for 40 years, was the most challenging and rewarding. The Waco Tribune published an article when he killed a deer with his first arrow in his first bow hunting trip, and then did it again from the same tree the next year. He and Nan traveled together on many family vacations and many cruises, bus tours, and ten days in Paris as a last trip.

Rodney frequently expressed gratitude for a long, active, and productive 94 years of life with his family, defying the odds of having triple bypass surgery at the age of 53. He espoused the idea of a life that contributes more than it takes. He served in many leadership capacities for Waco organizations, including Heart of Texas Fair, Boy Scouts, Planned Parenthood, Central Texas Chapter of CPAs; United Way Board of Directors, and others. He helped establish and served as first Board President of Waco Family Counseling and Children’s Services, hiring its first director. His Brown Family Foundation, administered by the Waco Foundation, invests in the future of Waco by supporting Seventh & James Baptist Church, Meals On Wheels, Salvation Army, Planned Parenthood, and Alzheimer’s Research. Beyond that, he leaves a legacy of individuals he quietly assisted through difficult times. He gave the full measure of care and devotion to Nan as they lived through her Alzheimer's Disease, offering a final example of what “contributing more than one takes” really means.

In Rodney’s own words, after reflecting on his childhood, interests, careers, and life with Nan: “But the best part of my life was seeing our children and grandchildren grow into responsible, caring, successful adults (all that really matters).”

He was preceded in death by his parents; wife, Audrey Anne Brown; brother, Aubrey Brown; and sister, Vera Dean Day.

Rodney is survived by his children, Rodney L. Brown, Jr. of Seattle, Wash., Lyn Brown Kent of Tulsa, Okla., and Kevin L. Brown of Chicago, Ill.; their spouses, Catherine Conolly, Paul Kent, and Harriett Kelley; and grandchildren, Andrew L. Kent of London, England; Abbey C. Brown of Olympia, Wash., Collin L. Kent of Durham, NC; and Benjamin K. Brown of Chicago, Ill.

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to The Waco Foundation’s Brown Family Fund for Alzheimer’s Research, the Animal Birth Control Clinic, or the Humane Society of Central Texas.