Irishman Speaks - Conor Cunneen

Mark Twain, the most successful of all humorous keynote speakers (even if he was not Irish!), was an inveterate smoker. “I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time,” he said during one of the speeches that saw him lauded as the finest humorous inspirational business keynote speaker – even if not on foodservice or financial services – of his era. While this speech was on a topic dear to his heart, it did not reach the levels of many of his wonderful speeches.

Given that Mark Twain left this earth in 1910, he will not be available should you be seeking an inspirational, motivational, humorous keynote speaker. However, don’t despair, the Irish keynote speaker is here! The advantage of selecting Irish keynote speaker Conor Cunneen for your next conference is that he is very much alive, has won numerous awards recognizing his ability as a humorous keynote speaker including Chicago Humorous Speaker of the Year for a speech on Customer Service in San Quentin Jail.

This Chicago based Irish keynote speaker’s presentations on Vision, Attitude, Baaad Business Poetry! and The Brand Experience have Energized, Educated and Entertained audience from Harley-Davidson to Helsinki, from Memphis to Malaga and many places in between.

Go on – Provide your event with a Top o’ the Morning Feeling by contacting Conor Cunneen. You will appreciate why testimonials include:

“In my close to thirty years of association work, I have never seen a speaker as well received as you.”  Incentive Marketing Association 

And now – at last - some words from a wonderful motivational humorist. 

Joseph Choate (1832-1917) was an accomplished and respected lawyer and diplomat and indeed by many accounts a witty and humorous keynote and after-dinner speaker. He was a founder of the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Museum of Natural History. President McKinley appointed him Ambassador to England, a position he served honorably 1899-1905. You can read Choate’s Address on Lincoln on this website.

THE DINNER TO MR. CHOATE

          AT A DINNER GIVEN IN HONOR OF AMBASSADOR JOSEPH H. CHOATE AT
          THE LOTOS CLUB, NOVEMBER 24, 1902

          The speakers, among others, were: Senator Depew, William Henry
          White, Speaker Thomas Reed, and Mr. Choate.  Mr. Clemens spoke,
          in part, as follows:

The greatness of this country rests on two anecdotes.  The first one is
that of Washington and his hatchet, representing the foundation of true
speaking, which is the characteristic of our people.  The second one is
an old one, and I've been waiting to hear it to-night; but as nobody has
told it yet, I will tell it.

You've heard it before, and you'll hear it many, many times more.  It is
an anecdote of our guest, of the time when he was engaged as a young man
with a gentle Hebrew, in the process of skinning the client.  The main
part in that business is the collection of the bill for services in
skinning the man.  "Services" is the term used in that craft for the
operation of that kind-diplomatic in its nature.

Choate's--co-respondent--made out a bill for $500 for his services, so
called.  But Choate told him he had better leave the matter to him, and
the next day he collected the bill for the services and handed the Hebrew
$5000, saying, "That's your half of the loot," and inducing that
memorable response: "Almost thou persuadest me to be a Christian."

The deep-thinkers didn't merely laugh when that happened.  They stopped
to think, and said "There's a rising man.  He must be rescued from the
law and consecrated to diplomacy.  The commercial advantages of a great
nation lie there in that man's keeping.  We no longer require a man to
take care of our moral character before the world.  Washington and his
anecdote have done that.  We require a man to take care of our commercial
prosperity."

Mr. Choate has carried that trait with him, and, as Mr. Carnegie has
said, he has worked like a mole underground.

We see the result when American railroad iron is sold so cheap in England
that the poorest family can have it.  He has so beguiled that Cabinet of
England.

He has been spreading the commerce of this nation, and has depressed
English commerce in the same ratio.  This was the principle underlying
that anecdote, and the wise men saw it; the principle of give and take
--give one and take ten--the principle of diplomacy.