It seems like Mr. Bennett has been in the road building business all his life. He has been part of highway and bridge construction since the Great Depression days when earth movers were mules and wheelers and bridge work was done by manual labor.

In 1934 at the age of 22, Mr. Bennett earned a degree in civil engineering from Auburn University and spent his early career working as a highway design engineer with the Alabama and Georgia highway departments.

His career was interrupted by World War II, during which he served in the China, Burma and India Theater. He returned to Montgomery after the war and founded Bennett Construction Company. For the next 41 years, he was involved in many state and interstate road and bridge projects, such as the grading and drainage portion of the first section of what was to become Interstate 65 - the main route between Mobile and Chicago, or in my case, Montgomery and Birmingham.

Mr. Bennett was an active member of the Alabama Road Builders Association and served as President in 1964. When Mr. Bennett decided to close his company in 1987, he briefly considered retirement, but quickly learned that he wasn't quite ready to slow down. So, he developed a partnership with the McInnis family and practiced until his actual retirement after nearly 70 years of service.