You’re exactly right. The 50’s 16 to 20 year olds were raised to respect people and to have a work ethic. Drug use was not considered cool. Many high schoolers had some kind of job even if only in the summers.
Even though it was peacetime, people had to consider the military because there was still a draft. Drug use and the anti-establishment thing really took off in the sixties. I got married and started a family and cussed every time I’d see a college campus demonstration or more often a riot on TV.
There were good things too but these anti everything crowd nuts got the spotlight.
Anyone who graduated from a public high school after 1965 was mercilessly interrogated, drug-tested, stripped, high-pressure-washed, cavity searched, hair-cutted, beaten with ax-handles, and then permitted to interview after being given, and passing various SATs, New York State Regents Exams in every subject, and proving they could do 25 chin-ups and run 5 miles in 30 minutes. As I recall, I suggested being even tougher on the females.
Before being permitted to speak with any employee already on the payroll, they were also made to memorize the immortal Sherwin Cody text, "Do You Make These Embarrassing Mistakes in English?"
Saved us a bloody fortune.
In many ways, 1960 marked a true turning point. The crooked election that put JFK (objectively a President who made Warren G. Harding look good)in office marked the ascendancy, nay the triumph, of incandescent bullshiite over any semblance of reality or common sense. Downhill all the way after that.