"the first folk club[was the Topic in Bradford 1956?"

I do the website for The Topic, including writing up the history page, where I looked a bit into the question of what is currently the oldest folk club, though not what was the first. There were predecessors, like the Ballads and Blues in 1953, and so The Topic doesn't claim to be first; it does claim at least to be the oldest still-existing continuously-operating weekly English-style pub-based folk club, though as a matter of fact for the last year it has been in the Bradford Irish Club and not in a pub.

It has been going since 1956 and as far as I can tell has only been dark/closed on about 35 nights in that time (Xmas day 2008 and New year's Day 2009 were the first closed nights in 5 years).

As a matter of minor interest the Topic's guest next week is Marie Little, who is the first name on our current listing of past guests 1970-2009, having performed in October 1970. Unfortunately records of who appeared when between 1956-1970 is lost or mislaid (though The Humblebums appeared in October 1968, I believe).