All of this because the man can talk. There is an entire public-speaking industry out there. Corporations, trade associations, schools and almost any organization you can think of hire speakers, either for entertainment or increased productivity or both at trade shows and conventions and other gatherings.

"It's a multimillion-dollar industry," says Tony Berardo, who is a booking agent and vice president of a speakers bureau called Leading Authorities. "It can feed a lot of people."

Clark, who was inducted into the National Speakers Association Hall of Fame this year, hooks audiences largely with stories, many of them of his own creation. His message is a positive-thinking, live-your-dream, passionate-living amalgam, but a big part of the product is Clark himself. Stephen Covey can send motivational speakers into corporate America to lecture on the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, but nobody else can be Dan Clark. What Clark is really selling is Clark, and it isn't cheap. His speaking fee: $15,000 per. (He does military and church functions gratis.)

"He's one of the most requested motivational speakers on the circuit," says Berardo. "He's unique. He's an athlete, a musician, a writer, and he is a master storyteller. He can work a crowd. Most (speakers) bring a canned program. He does it all, and he can tailor his message to the crowd. He's one of the best out there."

In another incarnation, Clark, who at 50 is a rangy, fit 6-foot-5, was an athlete, which is where his story really begins. He was a ski racer, golden-gloves boxer and motocross racer, and he competed for the East High School football, basketball, baseball and track teams. He won a scholarship to play football and baseball at the University of Utah, where he also found time to dabble in modeling and acting. (He had small, non-speaking parts in three TV movies.)

After serving a mission for his church, he started at defensive end as a sophomore in 1978. His athletic career came to an abrupt end the following year when a tackling drill left him with a cracked vertebra in his neck and a severed nerve in his right shoulder.

One eye drooped. His right side was numb and his right arm dangled at his side. For a few hours he couldn't even talk. His pro football aspirations were crushed. "I visited 16 doctors around the country, and they said the most I could hope for was a 10 percent recovery," recalls Clark. "I became a recluse, an emotional wreck. It was the loneliest time of my life. All my hopes and dreams were destroyed."

With fanatical dedication to his rehab — he once spent seven hours working in his room just to raise his hand above his shoulder — Clark recovered full function in a couple of years. (He still has numbness in his right leg and shoulder.) But the change in the direction of his life was permanent.