Nothing much changed then, in half a century of, so called, selection. In 1964,
Meanwhile......For the benefit of younger readers a bit of context: In 1964
I was a spotter (who wasn't yet old enough to have spots) at the airport formerly known as Ringway. BOAC were flying the likes of Viscounts and BOAC had 707's, ( I think, I must check my spotters logs).
Since then I've been through one of the iterations of the BA selection process, served over a quarter of a century in BA, and survived routine checks, conversion and command upgrades and am now past the former compulsory retirement age of 55. Like the vast vast majority of my colleagues in BA I have never been in a lodge, indulged in funny handshakes or gone around with a trouser leg rolled up (well, not when sober). As far as I'm aware not being "in the club" hasn't done any lasting harm.
In other words whilst some of the stories about BA selection process "back in the day" are interesting, they are no resemblance to the modern HR driven, computer scored, pier reviewed sausage machine.