I went to the Folk Club at Wellington Teacher's Training College in 1963. I think that was the year it started.
Hank Walter, originally from the US, would hold folk song parties where people were handed a song sheet and expected to sing along. Our music lecturer (Yvonne Du Fresne) was one of the people who attended these parties and that's where our first songs came from.
Hank also had an extensive record collection and Yvonne borrowed many of them to play for us. That's where we first heard Joan Baez and Bob Gibson etc. and started learning new songs.
The club at Victoria University of Wellington started the following year and other folk clubs in other NZ universities followed after.
But informal folk gatherings had been held at local coffee bars prior to this - the Monde Marie had live singers from about 1958 tho' I believe Mary Seddon was inspired by her time in France rather than a wish to present American folk.
Folk groups like the Weavers and Kingston Trio had been on NZ radio all through the 50s so many of the songs were already known - we just needed a chance to do it ourselves. So we gravitated to like-minded people and clubs were formed.
But when was the first one?
Robyn