[2] Blinn debuted on stage as an adult early in the 1890s with a traveling company in the western United States.

He appeared in silent films and was the director of popular one-act plays at New York's Princess Theatre.

[5] For three years Blinn acted in London in The Only Way, Don Juan's Last Wager, and Ib and Little Christina.

[2] His Broadway stage successes include The Duchess of Dantzic (1903, as Napoleon), Salvation Nell (1908) in a breakout performance as the brutish husband of Mrs. Fiske, Within the Law (1912), Molière (1919), A Woman of No Importance (1916), The Lady of the Camellias (1917), and Getting Together (1918).

Some of his finest silent screen accomplishments are in McTeague (1916), The Bad Man (1923), Rosita (1923), Yolanda (1924), and Janice Meredith (1924), the latter two films both starring Marion Davies.