Researching John Peel

Peel was one of the first broadcasters to play psychedelic rock and progressive rock records on British radio. He is widely acknowledged for promoting artists working in a multitude of genres, including pop, dub reggae, punk rock and post-punk, electronic music and dance music, indie rock, extreme metal, and British hip hop. Fellow DJ Paul Gambaccini described Peel as "the most important man in music for about a dozen years".

Peel's Radio 1 shows were notable for the regular "Peel sessions", which usually consisted of four songs recorded by an artist live in the BBC's studios, and which often provided the first major national coverage to bands that would later achieve fame. Another feature was the annual Festive Fifty countdown of his listeners' favourite records of the year.

Peel appeared on television occasionally as one of the presenters of Top of the Pops in the 1980s, and provided voice-over commentary for a number of BBC programmes. He became popular with the audience of BBC Radio 4 for his Home Truths programme, which ran from the 1990s, featuring unusual stories from listeners' domestic lives.

He attended Wellington College and Queens' College, Cambridge. His first career was in the Colonial Service; he survived imprisonment by the Japanese during the Second World War, when he was stationed in Singapore, to later serve terms as British Resident in Brunei and then Resident Commissioner in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands colony (now Kiribati and Tuvalu) before retiring in 1952. His father Sir William Peel had been Governor of Hong Kong.

Peel was elected as a member of the House of Commons at a by-election in 1957. In July 1959, he provoked angry responses from the House when he reacted to the Mau Mau rebellion in Kenya by stating: "There are obvious risks in dealing with desperate and sub-human individuals." In the resulting debate, Peel's remarks were denounced by Enoch Powell, who commented: "We cannot, we dare not, in Africa of all places, fall below our highest standards in the acceptance of responsibility". Though Peel's tenure of minor government positions was uninterrupted, he never reached the Cabinet.

He was a zealous advocate of British involvement in Europe, through the Council of Europe, the Western European Union, and eventually membership—of which he was a leading advocate—in the European Communities. In 1972, he was chosen President of the North Atlantic Assembly. In the following year he was knighted, and also became one of the first British members of the European Parliament.

Peel was the son of Thomas Peel of Peelfold. He was educated at Manchester Grammar School, and became a merchant.

Peel was elected as a Member of Parliament (MP) for Tamworth at a by-election in October 1863,following the succession to the peerage of the Liberal MP Viscount Raynham.He was re-elected in 1865,but was defeated at the 1868 general election by Henry Bulwer.

When Bulwer was elevated to the peerage in 1871, Peel was elected unopposedin his place,and held the seat until his own death in April 1872,aged 68.

Peel was also a Justice of the Peace for Warwickshire and Staffordshire.