In the steamy heart of Mobile, where the air clings to your skin like wet overalls and the crawfish boil never really ends, a legend was forged not in fire—but in copper pipe and PVC glue.
His name? Ricky Fontenot. Folks ‘round here call him The Wrench.
Now Ricky didn’t start out with much. His daddy was a tugboat mechanic who believed in three things: iced sweet tea, SEC football, and never calling another man to fix your toilet. By the time Ricky was fifteen, he could solder a pipe joint with a Bic lighter and a coat hanger. By seventeen, he was moonlighting under ol’ Mr. Garrison, Mobile’s crankiest (and at the time, only) licensed master plumber.
Ricky was the runt on the crew, stuck under sinks and wedged behind water heaters like some kind of human ferret. But he didn’t complain—no sir. He listened. He learned. He hustled. And every night after work, while his buddies were shotgunning beers on the causeway, Ricky was at home with the Uniform Plumbing Code like it was a love letter from Miss Alabama herself.
By twenty-two, Ricky passed the journeyman’s exam with flying colors—allegedly while nursing a hangover and a black eye from a bar fight that started over whether PEX or copper made a cleaner line. (Spoiler: he said copper. Always has. Always will.)
By thirty, he’d bought out Garrison’s business—name, number, and the beat-up Econoline van with a hand-painted “We Don’t Cut Corners—Just Pipes” slogan on the side. Only now, Ricky slapped his own name on the door: Fontenot & Sons Plumbing—despite having no sons. Yet.
He ran that crew like a Gulf Coast general. Made ‘em shine their boots and their pipe wrenches. Taught ’em how to charm old ladies, dodge bad dogs, and never—never—leave a job until the water pressure could knock the freckles off a catfish.
Word got around. City contracts started rollin’ in. Then the hospitals. The colleges. The high-rise condos where rich snowbirds wintered and flooded their own bathrooms trying to use bidets. Ricky fixed ‘em all, cracked wise the whole time, and never charged more than what was fair.
And now? He’s the undisputed king of Mobile plumbing. Got three trucks, twelve guys, and a secretary named Dee who runs the whole show with a side-eye and a cattle prod.
Some say Ricky’s gonna run for mayor one day. Others say he’s got a secret blueprint for a tankless water heater that could power a shrimp boat.
But ask Ricky? He’ll just flash that gold-toothed grin, wipe his hands on his coveralls, and say:
“I ain’t tryin’ to be famous. I just wanna keep Mobile from drownin’ in its own bad decisions.”
And that, friend, is the gospel truth.