""started on Rabelais for smut and, were still skilled debaters in the 70s"

I suppose that, collectively, the well educated people that you referred to could be termed mass - debaters.

During your perfect education were you never told not to use an apostrophe before "and" ?????? "

That is a mistaken understanding of the correct use for commas (which I expect is what you meant when you said apostrophes). The comma comes before a conjunction when it is used to join two independent clauses. In the case you quoted, the second clause is not independent, so no comma should go there; in fact, putting one there is wrong. Richard's usage is correct. FYI.