Virginia Elizabeth "Betty" Brown

Virginia Elizabeth "Betty" White Kuykendall Brown, 90, passed away peacefully Wednesday, February 8, 2017 at Life Care of Columbia.A private family service will be held at a later date. Burial will be in Mt. Olivet Cemetery in Nashville. Oakes & Nichols Funeral Directors are assisting the family with arrangements and condolences may be extended online at www.oakesandnichols.com.Born July 6, 1926, in Nashville, Tennessee, she was the first child of Elizabeth Gannaway White and Joris McDonald White. Joe was a design engineer who was responsible for buildings on the Peabody College campus and homes in both Davidson and Williamson Counties. Libby was the talented and creative decorator of those houses. During the Great Depression, the family (younger brother George XIV, too) moved to Williamson County and established a small dairy farm on the site of the present day Westhaven living development. Thus, Betty was a young girl in the country. One of her fondest memories is riding her favorite horse, Nellie. Betty rode the trolley to Nashville to attend the Ward Belmont School, now Harpeth Hall (where her grand-daughter, Lucy Kuykendall, followed her lead). Upon graduation Betty matriculated to Vanderbilt University, where she majored in Biology, pledged Delta Delta Delta, and met her future husband Sam Kuykendall, Jr., from Little Rock, AR. Sam graduated from Vanderbilt Medical School and took Betty for his training to Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, NY (Sam III and John), Carswell Air Force Base, Ft. Worth, and the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN (Davis), before moving back to Little Rock, where he established his practice in Cardio-thoracic surgery. Betty and Sam raised their three boys in Little Rock with his extended family all around. Betty was active in the Boys Club, the Episcopal Church (in which a George White forebear had served as rector in TN, SC, and GA.), and her garden of lilies, azaleas, and camellias. Sam, Jr. passed away in 1974; and Betty and her childhood Franklin sweetheart, Lewis Castner Brown, known as Sandy, found each other again. He too graduated from Vanderbilt as a design engineer. They married and moved to Greenville, SC, with Daniel and Fluor Construction Companies, where they so enjoyed many friends and their Carver cruiser boat, "Full Circle."Upon Sandy's retirement, they built a home in Westhaven and returned to Franklin, TN, another Full Circle, where they resided until moving in 2014 to The Bridge, their wonderfully caring home in Columbia. Sandy died February 28, 2015. She was also preceded in death by her son, John Holmes Kuykendall and brother, George Wagner White, XIV. Betty is survived by her sons, Sam (Lucy) Kuykendall, III of Columbia; and Davis (Valerie) Kuykendall of Charlotte, NC; five grandchildren; three great grandchildren; and daughter by marriage, Ruthie Brown Cherry of Nashville.