Did You Know?
Albert Einstein once said that if he could do it all over again, he would become a plumber. After he said this, the Plumbers and Steamfitters Union in Washington, D.C. made him an honorary member!
How to Get Started
Getting started toward a career as a plumber begins with exploring how water systems work, building things with your hands, and developing the problem-solving and spatial reasoning skills that plumbers rely on every day.
Explore the Basics
With a parent, open the cabinet under your kitchen or bathroom sink and examine the plumbing together. Follow the pipes with your eyes to identify the supply lines that bring water in, the drain that carries water out, and the curved pipe underneath called a P-trap. Ask your parent to point out the hot and cold shut-off valves and let you gently try turning them. Talk about why the pipes are different sizes and what might happen if the P-trap was missing. Afterward, draw a picture of what you saw and label each part.
Try It Out
Build a simple water delivery system using supplies from a hardware store. You'll need a few short pieces of PVC pipe, two or three elbow connectors, and a T-fitting (all available for a few dollars in the plumbing aisle). With a parent's help, connect the pieces to create a path that carries water from a funnel at the top into a cup or bowl at the bottom. Try different configurations to see if you can make the water change direction, split into two paths, or travel the longest distance possible without leaking at the joints. This is the same kind of spatial thinking plumbers use every day when designing pipe routes through buildings.
Join the Community
The next time a plumber visits your home for a repair or installation, ask your parent if you can watch the work and ask the plumber a few questions. Good questions include: what their favorite part of the job is, which tools they use most, and what surprised them about becoming a plumber. Many plumbers enjoy talking about their work, especially to curious kids. You can also visit the plumbing aisle at a hardware store with a parent to pick up different types of pipe fittings and see how they connect, or check whether your local hardware store offers free weekend workshops for kids that involve building projects.
How to Become a Plumber
Explore more resources for a future Plumber
Flushed With Pride: The Story of Thomas Crapper
Reyburn, Wallace
Why We Picked It
Career Connection
Plumbers design and install the sanitary systems that Thomas Crapper helped pioneer, and this biography of the Victorian water engineer who masterminded the fittings at Sandringham House and Westminster Abbey gives aspiring plumbers the most entertaining available account of where their profession's modern foundations were built.
The Water Came To A Stop (Next Up Trades)
Kiscaden, Ryan
Why We Picked It
Career Connection
Plumbers keep water flowing safely to every home and business they serve, and this book gives young readers their first understanding of the skilled, purposeful work that goes into maintaining the water systems everyone depends on every day.
The Great Stink of London: Sir Joseph Bazalgette and the Cleansing of the Victorian Metropolis
Stephen Halliday
Why We Picked It
Career Connection
Plumbers and sanitation engineers design and maintain the pipe systems that protect communities from disease, and Bazalgette's network, which ended London's centuries of cholera epidemics, is the most dramatic demonstration of what that work can accomplish at scale.