Bessye Anita Warren Bennett (1938–2000) was Connecticut’s first African American female lawyer. She was born on June 16, 1938 in Prairie View, Texas to educators Dr. Samuel Bennett and Juanita McBroom. Bennett graduated from Radcliffe College in Boston, Massachusetts in 1954, and married John Bennett (a Harvard University student at the time) shortly thereafter. By 1964, the couple eventually settled with their children in Hartford, Connecticut. Since she was working as an educator, Bennett earned a master's degree in education at Trinity College. She died on May 16, 2000 in Hartford.