Before his career in entertainment began, he worked at a drug-store soda fountain in Malden, was a second chef at a hotel in York Beach, Maine, and was a printer's devil at a print shop in Boston, among other jobs.

[1] Brown debuted professionally in Beacon Falls, Pennsylvania, with the Jimmy Evans Song Box Revue.

Brown was later teamed with Tim Ryan in the Columbia Pictures short film French Fried Frolic in 1949.

[citation needed] On television, Brown portrayed Jed Fame on Cimarron City[3] and Chauncey Kowalski on The Roaring 20's.

[3]: 899 In 1953, Brown had billing over an unknown Paul Newman in the fourth-season premiere episode of The Web, titled "One for the Road".

[citation needed] He made several guest appearances on Perry Mason, including in the role of murderer Harry Mitchell in the 1958 episode "The Case of the Gilded Lily".