If you’ve got a burning question about Birmingham that needs answering, then ask Carl Chinn. Proud Brummie and descendant of a real-life Peaky Blinders gangster, the legendary Birmingham historian has dedicated his entire life to championing the city’s unsung working class.
His mom is from Aston, his dad from Sparkbrook, and he was born in Moseley; Carl bleeds Birmingham and is a devoted advocate for the Second City—even appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2001 Birthday Honours, “for services to the community, especially Local History, in the West Midlands.”
Who is Carl Chinn?
Professor Carl Chinn earned his PhD in 1986 (focusing on urban working-class history and Birmingham) before using his knowledge as a regular columnist for the Birmingham Mail, a weekly radio host on BBC Radio WM, and as Professor of Community History at the University of Birmingham.
He’s also written dozens of books, made countless television appearances, and campaigned endlessly for historical recognition of many places in Birmingham—including to save the last back-to-back houses in Birmingham (which are now a museum) and set up a Bull Ring memorial to the victims of the Blitz.
Carl Chinn’s popularity has only soared with the popularity of the TV show Peaky Blinders, which has brought real interest to the real underbelly of Birmingham’s past. Not only was Carl’s Grandfather an illegal bookmaker, but his great-grandfather (Edward Derrick) was a real-life gangster, so he speaks from a place of real authority.
But don’t expect someone who will glamourise and fictionalise the acts of the Peaky Blinders. He openly calls his great-grandfather “an evil man” and takes little pride in the connection. It does, however, grant him a deeper understanding and care for the tales of real, ordinary people like few other historians—from the Chartists to the Windrush generation.
It is this interest in people that is the backbone of his new podcast ‘Our Lives, Our Stories’, where he speaks to everything from “well-known figures to community activists and changemakers, exploring the personal histories, experiences, challenges and moments that have shaped who they are.”
Guests include Birmingham icons like Robin Campbell and Joe Lycett, alongside lesser-known local heroes, like the man who turned the city’s St Patrick’s Parade into one of the largest in the world, Paul Smith, Stacey Barnfield, former editor of the Birmingham Post, and Dr Siobhán Stevenson, a Birmingham oral historian.
