Spain was pretty unstable before the 1970s. Civil wars, Franco's dictatorship... Pretty safe to assume pilgrims were scarce...
No, Marion-SantiagoIn love. that is not the reason of lack of pilgrims on those years. Spain was not unestable in terms of safety in those times, like tourism boom can testify, but the oposite...
During 1984 ( nine years afther Franco dies, during the worst years in modern Spain, when we was sufferin terrorism like never before) Elias Valiña, the priest of Cebreiro, started the work of his lifetime that work of global importance, the recuperation, delimitation and cleanship of the Camino, painting yellow arrows ( The cans of yellow paint, were a donation of road constructions company) and researching about the ancient Camino; likewise promoting
Camino de Santiago Friends societies. Those societies continued and improved this work over the years.
( When the spanish Guardia Civl found him near the french border painting arrows during those fearfull years of terrorism, they asked him what the hell was he doing. His answer was " I´m preparing a invasion")
Six years later, Manuel Fraga Iribarne, a former Franco´s cabinet minister was elected the President of Galician autonomic Goverment and he promoted the
Camino de Santiago. In 1993 the UNESCO proclaims el
Camino de Santiago Word Heritage, and from this moment started to become a tourist resource. Those circunstances in addition of the symbolic Pilgrimage of Pope J.Pablo II makes the
Camino de Santiago more popular along the world.
Later the published of novel, guides etc, in addition of movies, and the internet´s boom , explain the yearly increasing of popularity.