Mary Travers of Peter Paul and Mary dies of leukemia

Mary Travers the blond haired folk singer with the smoky voice has succumbed to leukemia at 72

By Stephen Pate – Mary Travis died in hospital in Danbury, Connecticut four years after her diagnosis of cancer at the age of 72.

Mary Travers was a member of Peter Paul and Mary, one of the most famous folk groups of the 1960s. Peter Paul and Mary rode the popularity wave of the 60s folk boom. They continued to be adored by their fans for the next 40 years.

They were a crossover from the less authentic Kingston Trio, blending protest songs and folk style guitar accompaniment with well crafted harmonies.  PP&M sounded real to the white university audiences and were instrumental in spreading folk music to the pop world.  Travers had been a folk singer since 1955. She had sung back up for Pete Seeger for Folkways Records but didn’t pursue singing seriously.

Peter Paul and Mary success

In 1961 Chicago folk club owner Albert Grossman put the tall blond Travers together with Peter Yarrow and Noel “Paul” Stokey to form the super folk group Peter Paul and Mary.

The image of the group was carefully cultivated to be squeaky clean. The name was an obvious biblical reference. The group performed in suit and tie, skirt and blouse outfits which was unusual for the bohemian folk crowd. Grossman was aiming for the middle class market.

Early hits were softball folk songs like “Lemon Tree” and “If I Had a Hammer.”

Grossman’s genius paid off when he partnered them with his iconic but scruffy songwriter Bob Dylan for the 1963 # 1 hit “Blowin in the Wind.”  The group went on to diminishing popularity as the music business changed. Artists began to market rebellion not the conformist 50’s clean image.

Mary Travers kissing Bob Dylan 1963 (Photo by Jim Marshall)

Peter Paul and Mary publicly rejected drugs and drug use, which put them at odds with the music scene.  Drugs were a big part of 1960s rock and roll and folk music. Ray Charles had made a hit of “Let’s Go Get Stoned”.  Dylan’s “Rainy Day Women” has the chorus of  “Everybody must get stoned.” The Beatles were obviously writing music under the influence of drugs.

Peter Paul and Mary denied that their hit song “Puff the Magic Dragon” was about drugs. “It is a children’s song,” they said when I interviewed them in 1965.

Without specifically saying the word “drugs” they said “We don’t perform Mr. Tambourine Man for philosophical reasons.” In a Halifax, Nova Scotia interview after their concert, Mary Travers told me she did not agree with the use of drugs but wanted the quote deleted from the interview.

Mary Travers on the cover of In The Wind the Peter Paul and Mary hit album

Grossman shopped that Dylan tune to the West Coast group the Byrds for an early folk-rock success.

The world was passing by PPM and Marry Travers as folk music morphed into folk rock.

Grossman was a major promoter of other folk acts and one of the organizers behind the Newport Folk Festival.

Grossman was keeping PPM in clean zone for marketing. Parents felt safe with Peter Paul and Mary but threatened by Bob Dylan even when they sang

“Come mothers and fathers throughout the land.
Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.
Your sons and daughters are beyond your command…
For the times they are a’ changing.”

Bob Dylan “Times They Are A Changing”

The mid-60s were flat for PPM until their second # 1 hit “Leaving on a Jet Plane” in 1969. The John Denver penned song was their last success and the group broke up in 1970. The audience wanted something newer than bland 1961 folk music.

Protest singers

Peter Paul and Mary in Portsmouth, NH 2003 photo: Jim Newsom

Travers and PPM were active in the peace and civil rights protests of the 1960s.

They participated in the 1963 March on Washington and continued to be social activists throughout their career.

Mary Travers put out five solo albums in the 1970s, none of which are memorable except to her stalwart fans.

The group re-formed in 1979 and have been touring off and on ever since until Travers became too sick.

Bob Dylan and Albert Grossman

While Dylan went on to be a success on his own, Grossman’s early strategy was to market Dylan’s songs through more established acts like Peter Paul and Mary. He signed Dylan to Witmark and kept 75% of Dylan’s royalties. Dylan got only 25%. Grossman made money with PPM, his other acts and Dylan when he cross-marketed Dylan’s songs.

Dylan broke with Grossman in 1970 and Grossman sued him. The Dylan 1966 motorcycle accident is believed to be a ruse by Dylan to stop touring and enriching Grossman.

Dylan formed his own publishing company and refused to tour for Grossman again. Grossman died of a heart attack in 1986. Dylan settled the lawsuit with Sally Grossman his widow, who had been photographed for the album cover of Dylan’s “Bringing It All Back Home.Mary Travers had two solo albums, both available on vinyl.

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