Between 2009 and 2010 a small team, funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund and Birmingham City Council, set about creating a history and archive of Birmingham's Council-run children's homes between the years 1949 and 1990.
At that stage, it was not known how many children's homes there were, where they were or who was in them. Through trawling through Guardians of the Poor, Children's Committee, and Social Services minutes, the project has put together an online exhibition of children's homes in Birmingham. Added to this, information, we have some memories from people who used to live or work in the children's homes.

The result of our work is an online Directory of Birmingham's Council-run Children's Homes and a referenced paper version is available at Birmingham Archives & Heritage, as is a guide to the sources relating to the homes.

In addition to A potted history of Birmingham City Council Children’s Homes, you can also see gallery panels on the project produced in 2010.

Also online you can find Birmingham Childrens Homes - Resources for Schools.

Not all children's homes in Birmingham were run by the City Council and we have some contact details of other organisations which ran children's homes. You can also find out more about accessing case files in Looking for your own records?