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When Frank and Dugan Maddux started an info-tech company eight years ago, they chose to call it Gamewood Data Systems Inc. after a farm in Fauquier County that once belonged to Frank's grandparents.

It might seem unconventional to name a software company-turned Internet service provider-turned systems applications firm after an old-fashioned farm, but the Madduxes are not your typical entrepreneurs. For one thing, how many entrepreneurs are nephrologists? And how many of them actually practice nephrology while running their own million-dollar company?

The doctors Maddux met as undergrads at Vanderbilt University, where Dugan studied chemistry and Frank studied mathematics. Independent of one another, they moved on to the University of North Carolina where they met up again and received their doctorates in nephrology and a certificate in marriage.

After getting educated and hitched, they began looking for a place to practice nephrology together. Their search took them just across the border to Virginia and the Danville Urology Clinic. "For this size community, it's probably one of the better, larger practices around," Frank says.

In 1991, the Madduxes formed Gamewood Data Systems Inc. to sell software that Frank had written for a dialysis process. Then, in 1993, Frank took an interest in the Internet. But Southside Virginia didn't have access to the World Wide Web, so the Madduxes began teaching themselves telecommunications. And in June 1994, they opened up public access to the Internet. "We leased a 56-kilobit-per-second digital line between Danville and Sprint's Internet access point in D.C.," he explains. Frank then set up a "router and a Unix-based network for public dial-up access. ... We started with six modems, now we have 682."

While searching the Internet for resources related to their first specialty -- kidney failure -- the Madduxes found only 35 sites. So Frank and Dugan developed their own site -- Renalnet.

The site is devoted to providing information on the cause, treatment and management of kidney disease. Today, an Internet search yields thousands of similar sites, but few are quite like Renalnet. In 1997, a University of North Carolina intern -- Mark Andrews -- redesigned the Renalnet site and added a database engine.

But even before Andrews came in and worked his magic, Renalnet was getting lots of attention. In 1995, the site was nominated for the Computerworld Smithsonian Awards Program, which documents information-technology progress as it unfolds. As a nominee, Renalnet is now preserved in the permanent collection at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History.

Today, the Madduxes are as busy as ever. Gamewood has a dial-up community of about 4,500 customers, and it hosts 90 web sites. Clients include Dan River Inc., the Danville Register & Bee, Danville Regional Medical Center and Media General Community Publishing web sites.

Gamewood's unconventional headquarters -- an 1898 Victorian home in the heart of Danville -- accommodates three of its eight full-time employees, the rest telecommute from home.

Maddux credits his top-notch staff -- from the technical support people to the systems administrator to the office manager -- for much of the company's success. He also convinced his father to come out of retirement to serve as general manager. "I pleaded for him to come help," Frank says. ... "My wife and I have a hectic schedule."