Nerd: The entire Riverside CB set was reissued on Washington (all single records- no double albums but all the same cuts, text, inserts) when Riverside cut out its folkmusic section. Washington was also Bill Grauer Productions.

It was Child's clear intent, in E&SPB (according to Kittredge) specifically to only print popular ballads- That is, those that had been sung popularly (by any level of society) and not those that existed only in commercial productions or in broadsides. He clearly knew the difference - his earlier works included "ancient poetry" and broadsides but these were cut out for E&SPB.

Thing is, as you said, he was a library researcher and never a field man. He was completely unaware that any of the ballads were still being sung - maybe only "Bonnie Barbry Allen" and one or two others. It's a shame that he never read Greig. Greig read Child and was aware of the irony that Child was saying songs had been dead hundreds of years that Greig was currently collecting in the field.