Meet Adrienne Bennett, the first Black woman master plumber who now has her own contracting company

Adrienne Bennett was the first black woman in the United States to become a master plumber. The Detroit native excelled in math and science and initially wanted to study engineering and metallurgy at university. However, after a racist incident, she lost faith in higher education.

She worked for a few years doing various jobs and advocating for people on government assistance. At a political event for Jimmy Carter in 1976, Gus Dowels, a recruiter for the Mechanical Contractors Association of Detroit, asked her if she would be interested in working for $50,000 a year while she looked for her next career. Dowels wanted to recruit minority women for a government-sponsored skilled trades apprenticeship program.

Bennett considered the offer and at the age of 22, the trailblazer took the entrance exam for the five-year apprenticeship program of the plumbers' union Local 98.

As the only woman on site among numerous men, she was frequently bullied and harassed throughout her career and was often pressured to give up.

She told CNN: “I always wore a very heavy tool belt around my waist. I did that for protection because men would try to grope me inappropriately.”

“I was often the only woman among up to 100 men on a construction site.”

Bennett, the fourth of eight siblings, attributed her work ethic and discipline to her education at a parochial school. “From a young age, I was taught to finish what you start and to do your job well,” she noted.

Despite all the criticism, Bennett became the first black female master plumber in the United States at the age of 30. This was after she had accumulated the required 4,000 hours of experience she needed to take the master plumber exam and passed the exam. After receiving her state license, she became not only the first black female master plumber in the state of Michigan, but in the entire United States.

During her extensive career in the plumbing field, she has served as a journeyman plumber, master plumber, project manager, plumbing inspector, and building inspector for the City of Detroit, among other positions.

Her experiences soon landed her the position of founder and CEO of Detroit-based Benkari LLC, as well as an independent contractor. She founded the commercial plumbing and water conservation company Benkari in 2008 with her son AK Bennett as a business partner when she felt she had reached the pinnacle of her career.

“I was a journeyman plumber, master plumber, project manager, plumbing inspector and building inspector for the city of Detroit for 10 years. I had no choice but to become an independent contractor. That was the last frontier,” she explained.

Her company won major contracts, including work for the Little Caesars Arena and the Anthony Wayne Housing Development, and was actively involved in Detroit's reconstruction.

She also joined the Architecture and Engineering Advisory Board at Lawrence Technological University, where she supported future generations of artisans.