BRANDON MCMILLAN, ‘LUCKY DOG’ This dog trainer and television host helps others connect dogs in need with people who need them STORY BY ALEXIS MCCURDY // PHOTOS BY CONNOR KUREK
ABOVE Service puppy-in-training, Anasazi, waits patiently for McMillan to give her a treat during his training session with 4 Paws for Ability on Ohio University’s campus.
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randon McMillan, host of the CBS show Lucky Dog and celebrity dog trainer, jokes that his love for animals is ingrained in his DNA. But after hearing McMillan share his story during his visit to Athens Oct. 28 as a Kennedy Lecture Series speaker, this canine connectivity certainly seems plausible. McMillan’s passion can be credited to his early foundations. His dad and uncle, hailing from Northern England, ran away in their youth to Gunther Gable William’s circus. In seven years, the two progressed to owning and running their own acts. 44 | WINTER/SPRING 2020
McMillan grew up alongside wild animals, learning the art of taming and loving them. In one picture, you can see his mom holding him in one hand, feeding him with a bottle and doing the same with a baby tiger with the other. “They were not just our animals; they were our family,” McMillan said at the lecture. McMillan himself left home when he was almost 16 and lived in Hawaii for the next four years. At the time, McMillan said his life was rapidly spiraling downhill. His uncle eventually contacted him and offered him a job, which McMillan calls a deal of a lifetime.
McMillan’s uncle owned a wild animal training company in Los Angeles that focused on training animals for movies and commercials, and at age 19 McMillan moved to Los Angeles to join him. After enjoying the bright lights of Hollywood for a few years, McMillan experienced a life change. He says this shift began after he read statistics about how many dogs were euthanized in America, which was then around 2 million annually. During that same time, McMillan says he was living next to an animal shelter, and he could often hear barks and howls coming from the animals.
