40 Fun Facts About Birmingham, England

Birmingham, England, claims more miles of canal than which Italian city, a legacy of its industrial past?

Venice is the comparison Brummies love: the Birmingham Canal Navigations once ran to about 160 miles, and just over 100 miles are still navigable, mostly by narrowboats and tourists.

Alfred Bird devised his Birmingham custard powder in 1837 because his wife could not eat which ingredient?

Eggs thicken traditional custard, so Bird, a chemist, used cornflour instead; the egg-free version was served to dinner guests one evening and went down so well that he put it on sale.

George Cadbury, a Quaker, kept which business out of Bournville, his model village beside the chocolate works?

Pubs have never been built in Bournville, although a licensed members' bar has operated at Rowheath Pavilion since the late 1940s; the estate's layout became a blueprint for model villages across Britain.

The 'ring' in Birmingham's Bull Ring was an iron hoop to which bulls were tied for what, before slaughter?

Baiting took place on the green of the medieval Corn Cheaping market, which gave the Bull Ring its name; the 1964 Bull Ring Centre that later replaced it was the UK's first indoor city-centre shopping centre.

Duran Duran, formed in Birmingham in 1978, took their name from a villain in which 1968 science-fiction film?

Barbarella's villain Dr. Durand Durand, played by Milo O'Shea, gave the band its name the day after the film aired on the BBC in October 1978; they went on to become the resident band at the city's Rum Runner club.

Legend says the real Peaky Blinders of 1890s Birmingham stitched what into the peaks of their flat caps?

Razor blades in the cap are almost certainly a myth: disposable safety razors were not made in Britain until 1908, and the name more likely came from pulling the peak down over a victim's eyes.

Which American author wrote 'Rip Van Winkle' overnight while staying with his sister in Birmingham, England?

Washington Irving's sister Sarah had married Henry van Wart and settled in Birmingham, a city that inspired other pieces in 'The Sketch Book', the collection that also holds 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow'.

Birmingham's Assay Office, won by Matthew Boulton's lobbying in 1773, marks silver with which hallmark symbol?

An anchor went to landlocked Birmingham and a crown to Sheffield, supposedly on the toss of a coin at the Crown and Anchor tavern in London, where the two cities' campaigners had met.

Aston Villa's only European Cup triumph, a 1-0 win in Rotterdam in 1982, came against which German club?

Bayern Munich were beaten by a Peter Withe goal in the 67th minute, with Villa's reserve keeper Nigel Spink, making only his second first-team appearance, keeping them out after Jimmy Rimmer was hurt.

Aston Villa's founders in 1874 were members of what kind of institution at Villa Cross, Handsworth?

A Wesleyan chapel congregation started the club, and the name came from a nearby Georgian villa called Aston Villa; within 14 years Villa director McGregor had founded the Football League itself.

Obafemi Martins' 89th-minute goal won Birmingham City the 2011 League Cup final at Wembley against which club?

Arsenal's keeper Wojciech Szczęsny and defender Laurent Koscielny got in a tangle under a long ball, leaving Martins to score into an empty net and earn Birmingham City a place in the Europa League.

Under what name was Birmingham City founded in 1875, before becoming plain 'Birmingham' in 1905?

Small Heath Alliance dropped the 'Alliance' in 1888, and the club still plays in that district at St Andrew's, its home since 1906, where the rivalry with Aston Villa is fought out as the Second City derby.

In which year did England beat Australia by just two runs at Edgbaston, the narrowest margin in Ashes history?

2005's second Test began with Glenn McGrath treading on a stray cricket ball in the warm-up and ended with Michael Kasprowicz, Australia's last man, out with the visitors still two runs behind.

Birmingham took the 2022 Commonwealth Games after which South African city was stripped of them in 2017?

Durban lost the Games over financial problems, and Birmingham saw off Liverpool in a relaunched bid; the Games went on to add an estimated £1.2 billion to the UK economy.

Birmingham 2022's mascot, a multicoloured bull named after the Alexander Stadium's district, was called what?

Perry takes his name from Perry Barr, home of the Alexander Stadium, and is a bull because of the Bull Ring market; his hexagon-patterned hide was designed by a ten-year-old competition winner.

Which nickname did the Birmingham Evening Mail coin in 1965 for the unbuilt Gravelly Hill Interchange?

Spaghetti Junction was reporter Roy Smith's verdict on plans resembling 'a plate of spaghetti', and the finished 1972 interchange stands on 559 concrete columns above two rivers, three canals and two railway lines.

The 'Brumbrella', a Birmingham institution at Edgbaston cricket ground until 2000, was a motorised what?

A rain cover, motorised and distinctive, is what the Brumbrella was; Edgbaston, home of Warwickshire, also drew a record single-day Test crowd of 32,000 against the West Indies in 1957.

Birmingham's Lunar Society of Boulton, Watt and Erasmus Darwin met when, so that members could get home safely?

At the full moon the extra light made the journey home easier and safer before street lighting, and the members, who cheerfully called themselves 'lunaticks', met at Boulton's home among other venues.

Which Lunar Society chemist, discoverer of oxygen, fled Birmingham after a 1791 mob burned his home and lab?

Joseph Priestley, who also invented carbonated water, was targeted as a Dissenter sympathetic to the French Revolution; the 'Priestley Riots' wrecked four chapels and twenty-seven houses, and he emigrated to America.

Birmingham's gilded 'Golden Boys' statue shows Boulton, Watt and which pioneer of gas lighting?

William Murdoch, the Boulton & Watt engine erector who built a model steam carriage in 1784, joins his employers poring over an engine plan, which earned the 1956 statue its other nickname, 'The Carpet Salesmen'.

By the 1850s Birmingham made over half the world's supply of which writing item, successor to the quill?

Steel pen nibs came out of factories run by Gillott, Mason and others, where women made up over 70% of the workforce and some 100,000 varieties were produced at the trade's peak.

BSA, founded by fourteen Birmingham gunsmiths in 1861, was the world's top maker of what after buying Triumph?

Motorcycles from BSA's Armoury Road works once outsold every rival on earth, decades after the firm began by machine-making guns with the War Office's drawings and grew into bicycles, cars and even aircraft.

Alexander Parkes of Birmingham showed cellulose-based 'Parkesine' at London's 1862 exhibition: the first what?

Plastic's birth is generally dated to Parkesine, first made as a bulk material in Birmingham in 1855, although Parkes went bankrupt on scale-up costs and never profited from what became celluloid.

Which typeface is named after an 18th-century Birmingham printer, an atheist whose corpse was later put on show?

Baskerville wanted burial in a conical mill on his own land rather than consecrated ground, but a canal cut through it in 1821 and the landowner displayed the body until friends moved it to a church crypt.

Over half of all Spitfires came from a 'shadow factory' in which Birmingham district, later a Jaguar plant?

Castle Bromwich turned out 12,129 Spitfires, peaking at 320 a month, after Vickers-Armstrongs took over the Nuffield-built plant in 1940, and later built Lancaster bombers too.

Which Alec Issigonis-designed car, launched in 1959, was built at Birmingham's Longbridge plant for four decades?

Mini production ran from 1959 into 2000, with 5.38 million built, first as the Austin Seven and Morris Mini-Minor; Longbridge's workforce of 25,000 in the late 1960s had shrunk to 46 by 2025.

Which Black Sabbath singer from Aston did six weeks in Winson Green Prison at 17 for robbing a clothes shop?

Ozzy Osbourne's father refused to pay the fine to teach him a lesson; the future 'Prince of Darkness' had already worked as a trainee plumber, car-horn tuner and slaughterhouse worker before Black Sabbath.

Which store's 2003 Bullring building, designed by Future Systems, is clad in 15,000 anodised aluminium discs?

Selfridges' curved store cost £60 million, and its blue skin studded with discs became a textbook case of 'Blobitecture'; it even featured as a Windows 7 desktop background.

Which 1965 tower beside Birmingham's Bullring was listed, then turned into 232 flats by Urban Splash?

The Rotunda, 81 metres tall and Grade II listed, reopened in 2008 with six penthouses on its 20th floor; in 1974 a pub in its basement was one of the targets of the Birmingham pub bombings.

Birmingham Town Hall, opened in 1834, was modelled on the Roman Forum temple of which twin gods?

Castor and Pollux's temple gave its proportions to Hansom's design, and Hansom, of Hansom cab fame, went bankrupt building it; Mendelssohn's 'Elijah' had its premiere in the hall in 1846.

Dhruva Mistry's fountain 'The River' in Birmingham's Victoria Square is known to locals by what nickname?

The Floozie in the Jacuzzi was completed in 1994 and the square reopened by Diana, Princess of Wales; her pool once pumped 12,000 litres a minute, though leaks kept the water off for years.

'Big Brum' is the clock tower of which Victoria Square building, finished in 1879 to Yeoville Thomason's design?

The Council House cost £163,000, and its design was chosen over a Gothic rival after a council split; the balcony is where visiting dignitaries and victorious sports teams address the crowds below.

Which curry, cooked and served in a thin metal wok, was developed in Birmingham in the 1970s?

Balti is Hindi for 'bucket', Adil's in Sparkbrook has claimed since 1977 to be 'the home of Balti Cuisine', and an application to give 'Birmingham Balti' EU protected status failed.

HP Sauce, named after the Houses of Parliament, was made until 2007 at a factory in which Birmingham district?

HP Sauce came to Birmingham in 1899 when Nottingham grocer Frederick Garton handed the recipe to the Midland Vinegar Company to settle a debt; Heinz closed the Aston plant and moved production abroad.

Which tea brand, launched in Birmingham in 1903 by John Sumner Jr., takes its name from Mandarin for 'doctor'?

Typhoo was chosen because it tripped off the tongue and could be registered as a trademark; the firm began making tea bags in 1967 and a year later merged with Schweppes, then with Cadbury.

Which Cadbury bar, developed by George Cadbury Jr. in 1905, was later sold with the slogan 'a glass and a half'?

Dairy Milk's 1928 slogan advertised a higher milk content than rivals; by 1914 it was the company's best-seller and a century on it was still Britain's top-selling chocolate bar.

Which Birmingham reggae band named themselves after the government form for claiming unemployment benefit?

UB40 stood for Unemployment Benefit, Form 40, the attendance card issued by the Department of Employment; the multiracial band went on to two US number ones, including 'Red Red Wine'.

Jeff Lynne, Roy Wood and Bev Bevan formed which Birmingham band in 1970, later famed for a spaceship stage set?

ELO, the Electric Light Orchestra, fused pop with classical strings; their 1977 double album 'Out of the Blue' spawned 'Mr. Blue Sky' and a 92-date tour with a laser-lit spaceship stage.

Which Birmingham band, named after a brand of amphetamine, topped the UK chart in 1982 with 'Come On Eileen'?

Dexys Midnight Runners took their name from Dexedrine, the pill Northern Soul fans used to dance all night, and Kevin Rowland made recruits give up their jobs to rehearse all day.

Which author, who lived beside Sarehole Mill in Birmingham as a boy, later called the spot 'a kind of lost paradise'?

J. R. R. Tolkien moved to Sarehole in 1896 aged four, and the mill, Moseley Bog and the Clent and Lickey hills fed into his books; he called the spot 'a kind of lost paradise'.