I'm not denying that the technology was sort of there (especially/only if you were writing a corporate app that targeted one and only one browser, probably as a

I'm not denying that the technology was sort of there (especially/only if you were writing a corporate app that targeted one and only one browser, probably as a replacement for an in-house VB/WinForms app). My point, which you mostly reinforced, was that it was not at all common for a user opting not to enable javascript to see a completely broken public-facing site until relatively recently.