Thanks for posting this site. It's just amazing how much Dr. Carl Chinn has achieved over the last 20 years. There was a huge amount of catching up to do regarding the contemporary history of Birmingham in particular and we have much to thank Carl for in this respect. He took the opportunity to be the main historian for the city of Birmingham. His contribution is really astounding and will continue to be.
I say this because I myself wanted to expand my knowledge of the city and it's history from many aspects. In my endeavour to do this, starting in the mid l970's, I found that there was very little available on the history of the city of Birmingham overall except for the older books that had been written many years ago. I asked for information when I wrote to the City of Birmingham at the Council House and the main Birmingham Library. This would be in the early l980's. There was very little official information available to send to someone like myself. The photographs that were included came from the working Engineering files. There was no other source available. A few years on the city was casting off a lot of it's industrial mantle and moving in different directions and I received a beautifully illustrated book edition of the building of the Convention Centre which I was very happy to receive.
All that has changed now, of course. The City is well marketed and there is so much information in the form of books available. I have watched the Birmingham section of Waterstones Book Shop on New Street expand incredibly over the years. The choice of books is...well..huge. Also, the citizens of Birmingham are heavily involved in digging out their amazing collections re the history of the city from so many aspects and that this valuable information will be recorded online is just the best news. When we had our Centennial Reunion celebration of Fentham Girls School at Sutton Coldfield in April 2004 with 375 attendees, all ex-pupils, we (the Centennial Committee) put together some photo collages and school history going back almost 100 years. We also made an images CD which we sold a lot of copies of. The whole collection will be donated to Carl Chinn's project before too long as part of the Educational history of Birmingham.
Thanks to all who are working hard on the project.