Reddit reviews Get Smashed!: The Staggering Story of the Men Who Made the Adverts that Changed Our Lives

Check out Get Smashed for a rundown of just how nuts the world actually was back then.

As for Don, I think you overestimate the creative control he had. He lost the Hilton Account because he didn't perfectly meet the idiotic client request. He lost the Lucky Strike account because of something he had absolutely no control over. He didn't get the Honda account, even though he outplayed everyone else (it's implied they eventually get it, but relying on clients 'eventually' giving you their business is a good way to go out of business).

I agree that a lot of creatives look up to him because he was an incredibly creative figure, but more than that it was how smooth and charming and just generally old-school masculine he was. A lot of the men I know in advertising are constantly struggling with this idea that they're not doing real manly work, and that really everything we do is this empty, parasitic drain of just moving numbers around on a spreadsheet. Don was the opposite - he didn't move numbers around. Hell, he didn't care one bit about numbers. He acted! He did things. He fought in a war (even though he hid and pissed his pants.) He had sex with lots of secretaries. He was a gentleman's gentleman. And he had damn good ideas all the time.