The school’s purpose is to serve rural and regional communities, and Britt Conklin
can personally relay the benefits of living in such areas.
CREATORS
Dr. Britt Conklin traces the arch above an “H” brand embedded in hide. Dust particles and hair linger
around his hand as he makes the connection with this horse, one he realizes he first
met in another place, at another time.
He chuckles to himself as he explains his actions to the Texas Tech University School of Veterinary Medicine students who surround him in the arena of Mariposa Station in Amarillo. They shuffle closer through the dirt to hear each word from the associate
dean for clinical programs and professor.
“This was one of my past patients,” Conklin explains, his mind racing back more than
20 years ago when he was a part owner of Reata Equine Hospital in Weatherford. It
was there this hoof care specialist turned veterinarian developed a state-of-the-art
podiatry center that cared for cutting and quarter horses – some valued at multimillions.
“It was mind blowing at times that people gave us the responsibility to deal with
those animals,” he recalls.
Conklin earned this trust over the decades, first working as a farrier by removing
horseshoes, methodically scraping out packed dirt, trimming and rasping hooves to
create the ideal shape and length for better balance. But what truly sets him apart
in this trade is the perspective he gained during his transformation into a veterinarian.
He is two in one, eliminating the need to pass along a diagnosis for treatment. The
combination of his expertise enables him to guide his patients not only to comfort
and relief, but optimal performance through prescriptions like mechanical horseshoes
that reduce tension and provide sole support.
Conklin’s intervention slows the progression of disease. To a caretaker, he is considered
a miracle worker as they witness the progression of a horse struggling to train, exercise
and endure the normal wear and tear of everyday life to an entirely new animal, improving
mobility once the stress on their limbs, feet and joints is alleviated.
“I used to believe in what I did enough to think I could cure colic with a horseshoe,
but that’s just not possible – and a bit arrogant,” Conklin jokes.
The students understand enough about their instructor to respect him as an expert
in the diagnosis and treatment process for lameness issues. They pay the utmost attention
to Conklin as he demonstrates how to bend a horse’s leg and secure the hoof between
his knees.
It’s awkward for the first timers as Conklin makes the balancing act look easy. They
won’t even scratch the surface of farrier work during this lesson, but former student
and equine veterinarian Patrick Guerrero can attest to the payoff of listening to
Conklin’s advice from the ground up.
“He’s taught me that if you’re ever looking at any case or any problem, just break
it down into simple pieces, take a deep breath and go from there,” Guerrero notes.
“By following Dr. Conklin’s advice, I’ve started to realize, ‘Hey, I know what I’m
doing. All the training I’ve had up to this point has prepared me for this.’”
In a true circle, Conklin has become the kind of faculty member with real-world experience
he can remember gravitating toward as a veterinary student at Texas A&M University
in the late 1990s. He apprenticed under a Ph.D.-level farrier and worked alongside
others who were doing cutting-edge research on diseases of horses’ limbs and feet
during those formative years.
He is eager to answer the array of questions he receives that day, such as the most
common area where abscesses form. In special cases he even opens his home practice
to students interested in more complicated podiatry cases. His wife Lee Ann has had
the unique vantage point to observe her high school sweetheart investing in someone
just as many others have in him.
“Britt is proof that you have a choice when life tries to knock you down,” she says.
“He didn’t let his circumstances define him. If a young person is willing to try,
God will provide people to help and put opportunities in front of you that are yours
for the taking.”
Conklin doesn’t mind sharing his past with pupils, but he warns that it’s a “long
convoluted story.” The telling of it requires him to toss out the technical jargon
and open up, despite his crossed arms.
Finding His Footing
From a young age, Conklin was told the old wives’ tale, “If you wear out one pair
of shoes in the Texas Panhandle, you’ll never leave.” While he was unsure whether
that was true, that happened to his boots in Friona, Texas, a town of nearly 4,000
people at the time on the western edge of the Texas Panhandle.
His humble upbringing began with what he describes as a tumultuous childhood, having
never met his biological parents and his adoptive parents divorcing when he was young.
Conklin remained with his mother, and they made ends meet by hoeing cotton in the
summers until the heat was unbearable.
“I remember working for $3.25 an hour,” he muses. “I thought I was rich.”
That was far from reality. At one point they resided in a nearly 400-square-foot adobe
home. But despite facing financial woes, Lee Ann considered him a class clown.
“My first impression of him was in junior high band class,” she recalls. “He was often
called out for misbehavior, so I thought he was a troublemaker.”
This phase didn’t last long for Conklin. His mom was diagnosed with cancer when he
was just about to begin high school.
Barely a teenager, he stayed by her side as she fought the disease for five years.
“I had the pouring-in of so many different people, even through the long years of
my mother’s destructive cancer,” he remembers. “I would go stay with different people
and they would bring food. It was the true community feel.”
Conklin had just begun his senior year when his mother passed away. He could’ve been
angry and resorted to acting out, but Lee Ann witnessed a much different response.
“His godly character definitely showed,” she says. “He handled it with such grace
and strength that everyone in the community was in awe.”
A young man with a need for a firm foundation more than ever, Conklin’s next home
was afflicted with alcoholism and addiction. He has never fully brushed away the intense,
frightful moments he endured.
At an impressionable age, he faced a fork in the road and could foresee one path would
lead to destruction. Conklin did not necessarily choose the other route because it
was easy, but it was the one he believed would build a more solid future.
“The good Lord watched over me as I broke free from a horrible environment,” he acknowledges.
“Some children unfortunately go the other way – it leads them back to alcoholism and
addiction. But I did not want to end up back in the environment I had been exposed
to, and so that was a motivator that drove me.”
Several families in Friona selflessly boosted Conklin back onto his feet, particularly
his best friend’s parents and Lee Ann’s family. She, along with her parents, grew
to admire his work ethic, wise decision making and his ability to remain an athlete
and honor student despite his circumstances.
With a newfound support network, Conklin began to push himself academically, driven
mainly by determination. To get beyond his circumstances – to rise above the example
set for him – he needed to take his education seriously.
He worked hard not only in the classroom, but on farms and ranches, driving a tractor
and gaining experience with horses.
“I kind of had to raise myself and work to supply all of my funds, whether it was
for college or whatever it was,” he explains. “I did not want my upbringing to define
me – I wanted to be able to define it.”
By the time of his 1993 high school graduation, Conklin was not hardened by his struggles,
but sharpened by his accomplishments and skills that earned him admission to Texas
Tech. With Friona in his rearview mirror, he felt increasingly partial to his hometown
as he left it for Lubbock.
“I think that’s what really ties me deeply to that sense of community,” he shares,
“because of all those things that great salt-of-the-earth people did for me.”
And he had full intentions to pay that kindness forward in some small town, someday.
Boots on the Ground
As Conklin transitioned into a Red Raider, many of his peers were focused on celebrating
their newfound independence by partying. He admits he had fun but was too focused
to be tempted off track.
He frequented the places that began to forge him as he earned his animal science degree,
such as the University Library and the Texas Tech horse farm. His worn boots served him well there as he led breaking-and-training
classes despite being a student himself.
Along with loans and grants, Conklin soon discovered another way to keep afloat. He
had become handy enough at the horse farm that a farrier took to him, teaching him
the ins and outs of equine hoof care.
At first, Conklin was merely interested because he was “too cheap” to pay someone
else to shoe his horses. He didn’t think anything would come of the trade, but that
changed the more he practiced.
“It was a good way to make a living,” he recounts. “I could go to class, then go find
four or five horses to shoe or do whatever needed to be done, and so it gave me a
manageable income.”
Unbeknownst to Conklin, this side-gig was not only padding his wallet but also instilling
in him ideals that would eventually become his unwritten mission statement: to care
for God’s creatures and humans in a way that glorifies him.
By shaping hooves, he reset not only the horses, but his career trajectory. It was
his final year of college when he recognized he could forgo the ups and downs of a
career on a farm or ranch by practicing veterinary medicine.
Even though he was a bit behind course, Conklin wasn’t deterred. He scrambled to enroll
in summer classes and complete his prerequisites. His steady commitment led to what
he calls a “decent” GPA and a resume of experience that featured his entry-level positions
at veterinary clinics: work he considered fun.
Conklin graduated from Texas Tech in 1997 with all the boxes checked to apply to the
Texas A&M University School of Veterinary Medicine & Biomedical Sciences. He was accepted
on first application, with the admissions committee sharing that they were looking
for students like him from rural areas who could share insight about large-scale production
agriculture and the feedyard industry.
The more Conklin learned, the more he could visualize his individual role as a veterinarian.
“I enjoyed the fact that maybe I wasn’t so skilled in the small-animal side, but I
had much more significant experience than most of the students on the large-animal
side,” he says. “I felt really ahead of the curve at times when I was there, in that
regard. So, it felt like a great match.”
Conklin juggled veterinary school with his responsibilities as a farrier and his relationship
with Lee Ann, marrying her in 1998.
“At the time, we were so young,” she reminisces, “but I loved and supported that he
had high aspirations. Vet school gave him yet another chance to prove to himself that
he could rise to the occasion.”
Three years after they walked down the aisle, Conklin crossed the stage and earned
his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine. He and Lee Ann moved to the Weatherford area ready
to make a living, and he discovered the best way would be through the rare set of
skills he combined as both a farrier and a veterinarian.
Big Horseshoes to Fill
Conklin’s revelation led him to an opportunity to provide cutting-edge individual
animal care through the Alpha Equine Hospital and Breeding Center, which was an industry
leader in cutting and quarter horse veterinary care and breeding. This is when his
niche became performance podiatry, and he considered all his patients valuable.
“Being able to work on somebody’s prized backyard horse or a junior rodeo horse, you’re
sustaining an emotional connection,” he says. “Then the other end of that is sustaining
an asset: working on a $50 million animal and doing everything you can to make it
successful. The scope of that is what made it most exciting.”
Another thrilling venture developed for Conklin in 2004, when he became part owner
of Alpha Equine and renamed it the Reata Equine Hospital. He went on to form the Podiatry
Center at Reata, which was a goal of his for years and furthered the operation’s reputation
as one of the top equine hospitals in the nation.
Yet, something felt off in Conklin’s personal life. He and Lee Ann welcomed their
third child in 2009, and he wanted them to experience the epicenter of true agriculture
in the Panhandle, where he developed his strong morals.
“A lot of what I dealt with down there was kind of show agriculture,” he explains.
“What I mean by that is, a horse was not an animal that was used as a tool; it was
used as a showpiece. So, the connection to real agriculture was kind of distant.
“I wanted my children raised back where I was raised. I wanted them to sit on a tractor.
I wanted them to dig a post hole. I wanted them to ride horseback and brand. I wanted
them to feel what I felt because it developed my character.”
In 2012, Conklin informed his partners that he was moving closer to his hometown,
just an hour away, in Bushland. From there he worked with the animal health company
Boehringer-Ingelheim as a senior equine professional services veterinarian, after
which the company grew into the largest equine health provider in the world.
In an “interesting transition” for Conklin, he began to represent and support Boehringer-Ingelheim
products that aligned with his skillset and assisted with their further development.
The company sent him all over the globe to educate and train veterinarians with pharmaceuticals
and techniques through continuing education.
Each time his plane landed back in Amarillo, flying over sections upon sections of
farm and ranch land, Conklin was reminded he had made the right decision for his family
– despite all the changes.
“Coming back here reset the kids,” he affirms. “They realized the value of hard work
and grit that’s right here in the Panhandle.”
What he didn’t know was the greater purpose for his relocation. That wouldn’t be revealed
until around 2019, the same year he received the Distinguished Alumni Award from the
Davis College of Agricultural Sciences & Natural Resources.
His alma mater had been on his mind a lot during that time, as he and other veterinarians
evaluated news of the recently established Texas Tech School of Veterinary Medicine.
He admits he was skeptical, until he had a few visits with Guy Loneragan, dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine.
“Guy was really gracious early on in that he began to show me the real metrics and
the evidence behind what they were doing,” Conklin remembers. “When I took the time
to understand what the true mission was, I was like, ‘Holy cow. I am all in for that,
whatever help you need.’”
Many veterinary students go to practice where they are most comfortable, which is
typically around their hometown. With that mindset, the School of Veterinary Medicine
aimed to recruit and select students with a passion to practice in small, agricultural
and regional communities and utilize a curriculum focused on the competencies and
skills necessary to be successful in those practices.
Conklin believed he could assist this purpose by serving as a guest lecturer and consultant
from time to time, advising which practices students should connect with through his
experience of visiting veterinary practices throughout Texas.
But an email detailing a position opening from Loneragan revealed other intentions.
The role was for associate dean, and Conklin could not believe it. He assured himself
he was not an academic – in fact, as far from one as anyone could find.
However, as Loneragan explains, the job description perfectly matched Conklin’s skills.
He would not only lead the clinical year but facilitate relationships with the partnering
veterinary practices through his many contacts he made in the biopharma industry.
“Britt gets our purpose,” Loneragan says. “Britt lives our purpose. Britt is committed
to our purpose, and he helps embrace a sense of place that no one else can. Britt
is the ideal person to build and lead our unique and exciting program.”
Still, Conklin feared he would be an oddity and disrupter at times, making it difficult
to fit into an academic environment. But as Lee Ann has seen so often, her husband
is apt to reinvent himself, and the School of Veterinary Medicine posed an ideal challenge.
“We felt it to be divinely appointed, in a way,” she says. “We were astounded that
Amarillo was chosen for the site instead of Lubbock. It offered him the ability to
come off the road without moving again, use the contacts he made in his travel job,
use his amazing teaching, speaking and leadership abilities, not to mention the ability
to give back to the profession.”
The choice was clear for Conklin. He left Boehringer-Ingelheim on good terms, went
through the interview process and joined the School of Veterinary Medicine in February
2020. There was no office awaiting him – just a pasture that held a lot of promises.
Best Foot Forward
Faced with the daunting pressure of helping build a program from scratch, Conklin
simply resorted to what he knew best by leaning on his service tactics. He decided
to prioritize the School of Veterinary Medicine’s three “customers”: the students,
faculty and veterinary practitioners.
To him, the students are an easy sell with their unmatched drive that reminds him
of when he was in their shoes. Bettering their learning environment would require
Conklin to dismantle the traditional teaching hospitals that he compares to large
assembly lines.
Rather, he aimed to construct a clinical year that would strategically assemble students
into four-week rotations through 10 different veterinary practice partners out of
125 across Texas and New Mexico. Conklin admits the idea was controversial at first,
but he believed the format would cultivate what he considers key to student success
– a wide knowledge of methods and skills, plus a network of connections.
It took Conklin and his team years to bring the concept to fruition in 2024, when
the students began to polish their health care skills and client interactions by training
under experienced veterinarians. Just as he envisioned, by the time the students approached
their May graduation, their clinical knowledge helped them cross the stage and take
off.
“A lot of our practice partners feel that our students’ skill sets are far beyond
any other students they’ve had,” Conklin praises. “Some of them comment that they’re
better than the associate they’ve had for over a year. Their communication and professional
skills far exceeded the practices’ expectations, and they want to see more of that
product as we move forward.”
By placing students in practices ranging from small towns like Spearman and Hereford,
Conklin was able to prove his point that veterinarians who serve such areas will reap
the rewards of a low cost of living, educational opportunities and a tight-knit community.
The kind of place that will turn around and take care of you if that time comes.
And his pupils seemingly listened. Nearly the entire first School of Veterinary Medicine
graduating class of 61 students in 2025 dispersed across rural and regional communities
in Texas and New Mexico, improving and adding more resources and services to animal
caretakers.
Just as when a limping horse begins to gallop following Conklin’s care, plugging students
from his alma mater into practices that have faced a veterinarian shortage for decades
is beyond gratifying.
“We have made a significant impact just in the Panhandle itself,” he says with a note
of pride. “The future is pretty bright for our area.”
It proves that Conklin is still in the business of refining, but less with tools like
rasps and nippers and more with his words and steady presence. He can’t prescribe
a shoe to make students’ next steps easier, but his antidote for the sole is the lifelong
payoff of wearing out a pair of boots on Panhandle soil.
He knows now there’s merit in that old wives’ tale.
“The good Lord has been so kind to me and my family,” he reflects. “You don’t know
where you’re going to end up a lot of times. You just keep moving forward, finding
opportunities, and plugging yourself into places where you can really make a difference.
And when you do that, the sky’s the limit.”