Mad Men goes back to the Office

Did they really smoke that much? A Newsweek secretary-turned-Washington correspondent says the on-screen sexism, drinking, and smoking capture the office culture of the early ’60s.

  I soon became aware that aside from me, the women working at the magazine were all graduates of the Seven Sisters colleges or other elite universities, had all been to Europe, and on their lunch hour either went shopping at Saks Fifth Avenue (then right around the corner from Newsweek) or visited their therapist. These smart, talented, and ambitious women were primarily fact checkers, but they also did reporting and were expected to provide emotional support when the men were doing their writing, everything from sharpening their pencils to picking up their dry cleaning.

full article here