Ralph C. Smedley (1878–1965) was an American public speaker. He founded Toastmasters International, an international educational non-profit organization that helps members develop communication and public speaking skills.
Born in Waverly, Illinois, Smedley graduated from the Illinois Wesleyan University in Bloomington, Illinois. He started working as the educational director at the local YMCA. Observing the need for interpersonal communication and management and leadership skills in the community, Smedley started a speaking club called Smedley Chapter One Club in 1905. This effort died quickly.
When Smedley took up a job at the YMCA in Santa Ana, California, he restarted the speaking-club initiative and started the official Toastmasters International in 1924. He wrote the “Manual of Instructions” and “Ten Lessons in Public Speaking.” By 1930, close to 30 Toastmasters clubs had opened, including a club in British Columbia, Canada.
Smedley started working for Toastmasters full time in 1941 and wrote the two manuals—“Basic Training” and “Beyond Basic Training”—which Toastmasters still uses. Toastmasters expanded to a worldwide organization with an estimated 400,000 members in 16,400 individual clubs located in 150 countries.
Smedley also wrote Speech Evaluation: The Art of Constructive Criticism (1940,) Beyond Basic Training (1961,) and The Advanced Speaker (1963.) His autobiography is The Story of Toastmasters: Reminiscences of the Founder (1959.)
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Ralph C. Smedley
Whatever your grade or position, if you know how and when to speak, and when to remain silent, your chances of real success are proportionately increased.
—Ralph C. Smedley
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