Heather Grout, Jane Hagedorn & Plumbers at BeaDay Plumbing
"I wanted to work for an all-women company." - Heather Grout
On a crisp January day, a teal-colored BeaDay Plumbing van chugs up Dingleberry Road in north Iowa City to a job in Morse, Iowa, a village with three streets and a population of three. The van works its way up a few hills and down a gravel road where Lammer’s Construction and Shay Electric vehicles already are in the driveway of a sky-blue farmhouse. Inside, construction workers and electricians are banging around the home with drills and jaunty laughs.
The plumbers and construction workers consult. While plumber Ann Bartles talks with the other crews, plumbing novice Heather Grout heads downstairs to a limestone basement and inspects several pipes that are too narrow for the amount of pressure needed in the new bathroom two floors above.
With preliminaries over, Grout unloads the BeaDay van, bringing in buckets, tool belts and pipe parts of all sizes. Bartles and Grout hop out of their vehicle to resume projects underway as part of a mammoth overhaul to transform a drafty brick-walled upstairs room into a luxurious bathroom and wardrobe. Their plumbing company had already drilled a hole for a new pipe through the floor, but the owners keep adjusting their plan: now they want the toilet moved a few inches.
This is a fairly typical day for BeaDay. The Iowa City business has been a fixture of trusted remodeling since 1980, when founder Jane Hagedorn and business partner Ginny Blaire opened their doors to the Iowa City community. The women of BeaDay Plumbing work in Iowa City and Coralville and small towns around. Hagedorn says the work keeps them busy enough within the Johnson County limits.
Breaking barriers in plumbing It all started when Jane Hagedorn just wanted “something more,” she recalls.
A physical education instructor at The University of Iowa, Hagedorn said she felt restless after 10 years. Her father and grandfather had both owned plumbing companies when she was a little girl, and she’d spent many afternoons cleaning out her father’s truck in the plumbing warehouse, just yards from her family’s home.
“I sort of back-doored the plumbing profession,” Hagedorn said. So at 30, she decided to try a career she had grown up around. “You have to think back to those times, it was not acceptable thing for girls or women to go into the trades.”
By 1985, she was a third-generation master plumber and first female in her family’s history to tackle the job. “I was ready for a change and I didn’t know if it would work or not but I figured it was time for something different, and it stuck,” Hagedorn said.
Women in the construction trades were rare, and still are. Only 12 percent of the construction force in Iowa is women, according to the Iowa Policy Project, and female pipe layers and plumbers constitute less than 2 percent of the 662 total employed in the state.
Despite the drastic gaps in gender, women in the trades today are not groundbreaking. Over 50 years ago, the first nationally recorded woman master plumber in the United States was Virginia native Lillian Baumbach, 21, who apprenticed under her father, W.J. Baumbach and received her master’s in plumbing in 1951. After she received her license, she became a local celebrity--even acting as a pen pal to over 250 men serving overseas in the Korean War and referred to in the Washington Evening Star as the “Pretty Plumber.”
For Hagedorn, the journey was a bit difficult, but not nearly as difficult as it was for her early friend and colleague, Ginny Blair. Initially Hagedorn teamed up with Blair, current owner and operator of Rosewater Plumbing in Iowa City, and who had trained under a male plumber for a number of years and was interested in opening her own business. She brought Hagedorn with her on a plumbing call to a cabin on the river, and Hagedorn said she fell in love doing the work. She quickly signed up as an apprentice and business partner.
“Ginny and I sort of opened our doors, went to the city of Iowa City and was told we could not do what we wanted to do until we had a master’s [highest degree of plumbing above a journeyman],” Hagedorn said.
But those early days were beset with complication. Blair had no record of payment or proof of the time she spent shadowing with a master plumber, so Iowa City refused her permission to apply for the master’s license test.
“Proof of her time in was a stickler for the city,” Hagedorn said. “What we ended up having to do was hire the assistance of a lawyer who went with her the second time. It took three tries for Ginny to pass the test and get her master’s.”
Once opened for business in 1980, the pair plunged into home plumbing repairs. But it became apparent to Hagedorn after seven years with Blair that remodeling was more interesting to her and the pair divided the business mutually. Hagedorn became the sole owner and operator of BeaDay Plumbing (a play on the word “bidet”) in 1987.
“I wanted to grow, have more people, and do what I’m doing now,” Hagedorn said.
Small steps for women in the trades In 1978, President Jimmy Carter laid out a series of “timetables” for women to enter the trades and construction, in hopes that a surge of women in the blue-collar workforce would create more jobs and opportunities for both sexes, writes Susan Eisenberg, in her book We’ll Call You if We Need You.
Unfortunately that surge has yet to come, Hagedorn said. Throughout its 29 years of business, BeaDay relies not only on its reputation but repeat customers and word-of-mouth advertising from colleagues such as Lammer’s Construction. However, the team of women still encounter some discrimination individually, but BeaDay plumber Andrea French said genders can’t be stereotyped, and neither can ages.
“There’s a lot more acceptance now,” she said. “Sometimes it’s a mixed bag. Sometimes it’s the older guys that are glad to have you and the younger ones are more resentful.”
Plumbing meetings or conferences are one place where the general term “guys” seems to bother them the most.
“They’ll be speaking to us in a crowd and just say ‘guys’ to everyone,” Grout said. “They forget that it’s not just guys in the room.”
Bartles remembers one conference when she and her colleagues were the only women plumbers in the room. The only other females present were models and showgirls.
“I don’t think we’ve come very far in terms of getting women involved,” Hagedorn said. “I think from a business standpoint, businesses have done what they needed to do to satisfy the law or whatever the requirements are. I think the bigger problem today is that young people don’t want to work quite as hard as we have to work. We don’t see the young women but we also don’t see the young men.”
Hagedorn makes a careful note to share that BeaDay is not a “women-only business.” She is very proud to be “women-owned and operated” but said she’s had male apprentices in the past, they just didn’t stay.
She would like to see a growth of women in the trades, and certainly hopes those considering the industries can recognize the benefits. “I’m prejudiced because I think women are better workers,” she said, smiling.
Unions have also opened up. In the beginning, women’s trade unions were not offered, Hagedorn said, and those opportunities along with classroom training have certainly changed for women. Still, at the end of the day, Hagedorn knows her place in Iowa City and the needs her business meets for its customers--male or female. Currently Hagedorn serves on the board that grants licenses to professionals on a state level rather than local. As a selected official of that board, she is thankful they chose to go with something more “diverse” than the regular boys’ club. Hagedorn calls her role as “a master plumber but also a minority and woman on the board.”
“I think because we have been in business for such a long time, we have a reputation that we do good work, and there’s some integrity in this business,” she said. “And we’re in a particularly liberal town. We’re in a community that accepts diversity."
Ann Bartles – Creaky joints to leaky pipes Bartles’ shaggy, brown mop of hair is covered under a stocking cap, her body clothed in thick pants, work boots and a BeaDay sweatshirt. On cold days, the women often wear long underwear, especially when working in basements where the temperature can be 10 to 20 degrees lower than upstairs.
“Want to meet Betty?” Bartles asked with smile, holding up a heavy, orange and cobalt snake-like tool used for snapping cast-iron pipes in older homes. “The name’s Betty Cracker.”
When Bartles began as an apprentice at BeaDay 11 years ago, she didn’t know anything and barely recognized a wrench, she said. After 15 years practicing physical therapy, Bartles said she wanted something new, something different--something still rewarding but physically demanding.
“I took some time off during my transition period, talked to Jane at a basketball game and said her apprentice quit,” Bartles said. “I told her I was interested but knew nothing.”
Bartles received her journeyman--or as the BeaDay team calls it “journeyperson”--license in February 2003 and calls her transition from that of “creaky joints” to “leaky joints.”
During some remodel work at an older home on River Street, Ann finally chews through the cast-iron pipe with Betty, after some grunting, grinding and heavy cursing. Some lukewarm water leaks from the seal as she pulls the pipe apart.
“What is this from here, Heather,” Bartles asks Grout, who's across the room. Grout puts down her drill and climbs down from a step ladder, squinting her eyes at the pipe. “Um, I’m not…sure,” Grout answers.
As Grout’s mentor on the job, Bartles asks her for causes and effects of problems--like certain seepage from a pipe or drain, how to drill a hole and how big to drill it when installing a pipe through a ceiling, or just what tool to use to get a task accomplished.
Teamwork in the trades
The BeaDay team includes four other women, most with similar family plumbing backgrounds. Hagedorn’s first hire was French, who apprenticed for a couple years under Hagedorn. Bartles came on after, followed shortly by Naomi Gallmeyer, both apprenticing under French and Hagedorn. The most recent hire is Grout.
A typical work day is 7:30 a.m. until 4:30 p.m. Hagedorn rarely requires holiday or weekend work, although they all pulled extra shifts and long hours during the 2008 flood, working 50 to 60 hours per week doing house calls for flood problems and assisting in emergency remodeling work.
The women generally go to jobs in teams of two. Hagedorn does not work on the homes or remodels with tools in hand anymore, but serves as the inspector for projects and new appointments, crunching the numbers, estimating time and space needed to accomplish a remodel. She also attends meetings around the state as a representative for women in the trades.
At the project in Morse, Bartles is frequently called upstairs with the Lammer’s Construction crew to discuss the changes made in the bathroom blueprints, while Heather continues analyzing the pipes below. The men curse and insult each other nonstop, and even bring Bartles in on the fun.
“You guys are bad, she’s writing all this, you know,” Bartles says, motioning toward the writer in the room. “Watch what you say. This is exactly what she’s talking about, women in male-dominated roles.”
“You girls and your bitchin’. You get everything handed to you on a silver fuckin’ platter,” a long-haired construction worker jokes. Bartles shoots him a nasty look and a smirk. “Nevermind, I don’t wanna go there,” he says, and retreats upstairs.
Heather Grout – The new generation Twenty-two-year-old Heather Grout is a little shy, and laughs at Bartles’ gutsy exchange with the Lammer’s Construction crew. As an apprentice, she’s still getting her bearings as a female career plumber.
Grout’s background also features plumbing. Her father, Wayne Grout, is the head plumber for the Iowa City school district. After graduating from the University of Northern Iowa with a degree in women’s studies and mass communication, she decided to do something completely different.
“I didn’t want a desk job, I knew that. I wanted to work for an all-women company, I knew that, too,” Grout said.
Grout’s apprentice work is new to the state of Iowa. The Plumbing Heating and Cooling Contractors of Iowa started two programs in 1992 and brought classes to the Kirkwood Community College campus two years later. In 2007, the Iowa Plumber and Mechanical Professional Licensing Act was passed requiring a four-year apprenticeship before a license can be received. After graduation from the program, she’ll apply for her journeypersons’ license.
“Heather represents, for me, the greatest--a pinnacle--because now we have a new generation,” Hagedorn said with the same smile she greets her customers with. “She might be the only one [woman] there, but there’s not one hiccup about her being there."
For now, the job is anything but glamorous. Grout calls herself “the grunt,” the one responsible for cleaning out the trucks, taking inventory on parts in the warehouse and getting pipes or equipment from the van when her partner calls for them.
When hours or projects are hard to come by, Hagedorn offers yard work and small errands for Grout to make her 40 hours per week. It doesn’t pay well yet, but she looks forward to the day it will. Right now she lives with her parents near Hills, Iowa, paying off her new car and student loans.
Though her apprenticeship is not always fun, she finds watching projects from start to finish is exciting. Plus she’s gotten a little tougher and more in shape carrying cast-iron pipes and 30-pound cases of tools.
At the River Street remodel, Grout aligns herself perfectly under the space on the ceiling where a three-inch hole for a new pipeline leading to the attic will be drilled. She fits the drill head, plugs in the battery and pushes up on the drill, gnawing through the thick wood with dusty shavings falling on her face and glasses.
“We do a lot more than water. We have to get on roofs, which can be scary if it’s steep,” Grout shouts, still running the screaming drill. “I should be wearing safety goggles, oops. I just gotta be careful. Need to think about hitting wires.”
Safety is a key concern. Clients sometimes assume the BeaDay crew need to take extra care because they’re women, but the hazards don’t discriminate.
When Grout encounters a half-inch splinter in her palm, she takes out worn box cutter, moves the blade up an inch and begins to poke and pry at the sliver of wood. Mumbling as she draws blood on her hand, she continues digging, taking out small pieces of pesky lumber one at a time.
“Damn splinters,” she curses, as she slides the blade back into her tool belt. “Oh well, it happens.”
Grout is still learning the trade. She has to study books of city codes, parts and procedures and has homework for her Kirkwood classes. Vocabulary tests, six to seven hours of homework a week and her full work load keeps her on track, she said. “It’s not like ‘college’ college when you can cram for at test and take it and be done. You really have to learn this stuff, let it sink in.”
When she’s not climbing roofs, drilling holes or taking on the grunt work, Grout watches comedy movies and listens to music, like most 20-somethings, but her attire has to change depending on where she is.
“People look at me funny in my work clothes in Cedar Falls,” Grout said, looking down at her baggy sweatshirt and stained carpenter pants which hide her hips and chest. “But Iowa City is so diverse, it’s great.”
BeaDay today – Milestones in the making Hagedorn and her BeaDay crew take part in the annual Habitat for Humanity homes around the city, even urging changes in construction to more energy and financially efficient features. A 2008 Women of Conviction award from United Way sits high on a shelf in Hagedorn’s office, conveniently located in the basement of her home, the same property where BeaDay’s warehouse sits, just like her father’s when she was a little girl.
In the warehouse, a cherry-print cat bed sits on a counter for Miss Brady, the shop cat and resident rodent-killer. Norman Rockwell's 'Rosie the Riveter' hangs with glory on the wall, and a small sign reading, “Men at Work – Women work all the time, but men need a sign when they work.”
“It’s that time of year again,” Hagedorn jokes while looking out the window to the icy rural forest that lines the company's backyard.
On a below-freezing day in Iowa City, the BeaDay answering machine is inundated with messages from home and business owners whose pipes had burst overnight. Blueprints clutter Hagedorn’s desk as she begins to arrange assignments. This morning, she has to plan impromptu appointments to help drain flooded water from a local humane society and residents' homes. She emotionally preps her crew for a hard day ahead.
Hagedorn appreciates her crew and the hard work they put in every day. In the summer, she invites her employees to her cabin in Minnesota where she can relax and enjoy the treasures of the lake. A sign on her desk reads, “Forced to work, born to fish.”
“Jane is definitely the best boss I’ve ever had, and I’ve had a few,” Bartles said. “She keeps us laughing and she really cares about us.”