Binny Lum (2 February 1915 - 1 November 2024) earlier known as Binnie Lum, was an Australian musician, poet and actor radio and TV host and documentarian, of part Chinese heritage. She was best known for her numerous (around 150) audio oral history recordings with numerous celebrities, her interviews literally documented a Who's Who's of 20th century culture and included stars of international stage and screen, like Vivian Leigh and Charlton Heston as well as music icons and artists, amongst them these included The Beatles, Barbra Streisand and Fred Astaire and notable historical figures like Edmund Hillary.
In the early days of Australian radio, Binny, alongside such stars as Queenie Ashton, Gwen Plumb, Ethel Lang and Margaret Christensen she was noted as being a pioneer for woman in broadcasting.
Lum was born Rowena Bernice Lum in Adelaide, South Australia in 1915 to a Chinese father, Lum Yow, who was a practitioner of natural Chinese medicine and an Australian mother, Elenora Laker. Due to her mixed heritage she was unable to go to school in her home town of Adelaide so settled in Melbourne, where she had more luck being enrolled at Presbyterian Ladies College.
She trained at Nora Stewart's dance school, alongside such luminaries as Robert Helpmann, and teamed up with another pupil Girlie Powell too sing and dance at various venues. On the strength of her composition's, she was initially looking to take up a scholarship to attend the Conservatorium of Music.
At the age of 16 she published a book called Poems.
Lum started her career in theatre with theBrighton Repertory Theatre, and first appeared on radio at 3XY in a radio play continuing on as an actor, accompanist, scriptwriter and compere, for there numerous productions She subsequently worked with 3AW,
In 1951 she joined 3KZ presenting the children's session, where she was billed as "Cousin Binnie" taking over the role from Florence "Dot" Cheers, the broadcasting wife of singer Smoky Dawson and later in 1953 worked at 3DB presenting the morning session.
She subsequntly moved into television broadcasting in 1957 she hosted Channel Nine's Thursday at One with Binnie Lum, it run until 1960 and was described by the network prior to the era of Mike Walsh and Ray Martin as their first daytime television programme. It was a live show aimed at women. She went on to host her own half hour daily program Binnie Time
She continued in radio, interviewing many celebrities and in 1964 travelled abroad to conduct many more interviews, notably including The Beatles.
In 2013 a collection of over 100 of her interviews were added to the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia's Sounds of Australia collection.