Little did I know that evening at Bryant,Ohio when I stood in front of that audience some fifty years ago that I was embarking on a great adventure that would require travel to 50 of our United States, 7 Canadian Provinces and Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Hong Kong to the Arctic Circle and hither and yon. Nor did I even suspect that I would encounter the Pest Control audience at Purdue University, Prisoners at Jackson Prison in Michigan and substitute for a current President of the United States at the Grand Hotel on Mackinac, Island.
I wasn’t even aware that I was a pioneer making what would come to be known as a “Power Point Presentation” using 35mm Slides created by some top graphic artists.
I worked for the Grand Trunk Western Railroad as a claim agent in Battle Creek, Michigan when I first met Notre Dame professor, Dr. Herb True, Ph D. Herb taught management classes and as a sideline he gave up to 200 speeches a year to major corporations and associations throughout the US and Canada. I attended a presentation he did for our Railroad managers. During a break I gave him half a dozen railroad jokes and answered his questions about the audience. In the second half of his presentation he used all of the jokes I’d given him and when he finished his talk there was abundant applause and he rushed over to me and said, “Art, I want you to work with me on my presentations. I want you on my team”. That moment changed my whole life. When I visited his office in South Bend, Indiana I learned that he had a staff of freelance researchers, idea people, readers, tape reviewers, travel experts, and a fantastic manager who handled his bookings and logistics. It enabled him to walk off a plane, into an auditorium, hand a tray of slides to someone with a slide projector all set up and agree to the plan that when he reached up and touched his tie the operator would move on to the next slide. Herb was a master performer, brilliant. He wore costumes. He might be a football referee or maybe an astronaut.
Herb had trays of different slides for different audiences. The team called “Team International Inc” had been working together for several years. My job was to contribute some fresh ideas and humor and Herb would phone me in my railroad office and quickly go through his whole speech. I was free to make any remarks about anything that popped into my mind. I could toss in new humor, old lines,ideas, whatever. Herb claimed that almost always I came up with something to make his presentation better. When he first asked me how I’d like to be compensated I told him I wanted to become a speaker some day. He gave me a fist full of textbooks on motivation and sales. He also grabbed a big fistful of his cassettes and other speakers’ presentations. After our first meeting at his office I set a personal goal. I wanted to do my first professional speech in six months.
The next week I attended my first meeting of our local Toastmasters Club in Battle Creek. When I discovered that their formal presentations ran from 5 to 7 minutes I began writing speech segments. I’d have one ready to present whenever one of those assigned was not ready. Many of our members tried to avoid speeches. Their company paid for their membership and for their dinner. They just wanted excuses to get out of the house. It worked out to be a perfect set up for me because it provided me with an audience. I’d do something different every week. In six months I had 30 to 45 minutes. For a couple of segments I used the slides Herb loaned me. I attended a meeting of entertainers in Lansing,Michigan and met a comic who did comedy at association meetings and it just worked out for me. When my six months of preparation was done I felt I was ready. An emergency came up and my new comic friend asked me if I could substitute for him. He paid me $100.
The fellow who introduced me had had quite a few drinks. I gave him my printed introduction and then rushed to the men’s room. Just a moment later when I returned I learned that he had glanced at my intro and said, “Our speaker this evening is the creator of the popular Marmaduke cartoon. He’s going to draw some cartoons for you.” My intro said. “He is a freelance writer. You might have seen some of his comedy ideas in the popular Marmaduke cartoon.” I had sold a couple of cartoon ideas to the artist, he created the cartoons and they were published nationally. So when I walked out in front of that audience they were just waiting for me to draw the dog, Marmaduke. I did not learn about this until 40 minutes later when I closed.
I had some wonderful new comedy lines, some I had created and some I had revised. .The slides were very professional. I had worked out stories that I felt were right on target. When I finished the applause was very appreciative. Then a number of members came up to me. “The dog? The dog?” “Marmaduke?” They all said, “Mr. Ford said you were going to draw Mamaduke” “He did?,” I pleaded. “I gave him my introduction.”
“He didn’t read it.” They said.
Now, hundreds, no, make that thousands of presentations later I have suffered through every single introduction.
It has been an exciting and rewarding journey.
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