Their albums grossed 40 million, and they surpassed Frank Sinatra as Capitol Records' no. 1 moneymaker. Unlike previous folksingers, the Trio projected a safe, wholesome , well-groomed, stable (they were married, and being married= stability) image. By 1962, The Trio had grossed $1.7 million in total earnings.
The folksingers became a corporation! Kingston Trio, Inc., a ten-company investment firm, was established. Properties included a restaurant, a group of music publishing companies, and an office building, among other holdings. The Trio's success inspired others to form singing groups.
In 1959, The Limeliters began performing; within a year, they were commanding $4,000 a week and had a best-selling album of international folk songs. (One of its members, Glenn Yarbrough, went on to solo success with "Baby The Rain Must Fall" a 1965 Top 20 hit.)
The New Christy Minstrels, formed in 1962, were blantantly commerical. Founder Randy Sparks even admitted that this group's purpose was strictly to cash in. Their first album sold over 100,000 copies and "Green Green" was a Top 20 hit in 1963.
The following year, Sparks sold his interest in the group for $2.5 million. (No further coment, except to say that one of its members, Barry McQuire, went on to have the VERY controversial hit, "Eve Of Destruction". (A no. 1 smash in 1965, though it was banned on many radio stations. Kenny Rogers was also a member!)
The "mainstreaming" of folk music actually led to the rediscovery of the real deal. College kids began listening to Odetta, Judy Collins, Woody Guthrie, Pete Seeger, the reformed Weavers, Appalachian folk music, bluegrass, and electric blues music.
Folk music became a full-blown craze. Coffeehouses sprang up everywhere. Album sales doubled from 1956 to 1961, as folk fans dropped the 45s for albums of their favorite groups. In early 1963, on Saturday night, ABC broadcast Hootenanny; each week viewers got a folk concert on a different campus. There were hootenanny magazines, sweat shirts, and even a film, "Hootenanny Hoot".
The civil rights movement(and a few years later, the anti-war and free speech movements) converged with and helped shape the decade's folk music. Many folk singers, social activists, and college students looked up to movement leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and new President John F. Kennedy as beacons of hope and inspiration.
College students, in particular, perceived JFK as "cool". He was young, energetic, college-educated (from Harvard!) and socially aware. He was seen as one of them. There were several singers and groups that I'm not sure could be considered pure folk, but did have a folk-type sound or did folk or protest songs in addition to other genres.
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