Business legend, devoted family man, patron of the arts, there are few more deserving winners of our Irish American of the Year than Coca-Cola president Don Keough. Longtime friend John Bergin reports.
Donald R. Keough, President and Chief Operating Officer of Coca-Cola Company, is 66 years old, has a pair of biceps about as hard as Irish basalt and large, square workman’s hands so articulate and expressive in their own way that the man hardly needs the gift of a speaking voice that can sweet-talk you into working till you drip for dear ol’ Coke or for dear ol’ Notre Dame… and shake down the thunder when you don’t.
When you meet Don Keough – and odds are you will if he keeps working the world at his current pace — you may not notice the hands because their owner is holding your shoulders, looking square into your eyes and speaking to you as though you and he had three minutes to live before God calls, “Time, gentlemen.” He is yours, no one else’s.
The Irish American of the Year is some piece of work, dear reader, one of those larger-than-life men whom you absolutely, positively know could have gone all the way in politics, law, teaching, preaching or whatever, but who opted instead to help deposit a hundred zillion bottles of America’s Coca-Cola in every corner of the world.
(When American blue jeans became Europe’s so-called red hot import, ice-cold Coca-Cola was there to greet them.) And, by the way, “every corner of the world” as defined by Coca-Cola today is more than 195 countries… and growing.
Don Keough’s options were not always as good and plentiful. In true Horatio Alger-style, this kid started life on a farm in northwest Iowa. The Depression took the farm; a fire took the farmhouse. And with a spirit that most citizens would call indomitable – and most readers of this publication would identify as basic Irish-American guts — the Keoughs worked their way back to a bigger farm, a better life. Some 40 years later, farm boy, Navy veteran, Creighton University graduate, Notre Dame trustee, Coca-Cola President, Donald R. Keough would indeed go to Washington, D.C., and receive the Horatio Alger Award of 1988.
Were Don Keough writing this piece – which thank goodness he is not because it would be too short, too modest and probably too mirthful for the occasion — he would have mentioned his wife, Mickie, first, his kids second, Coca-Cola third, Notre Dame fourth and then friends, friends, friends, friends, friends. And if you asked him, “What about God?” he’d probably tell you, “God’s in all of them.”
Of course, there are six full-grown Keough kids, three and three as gifted parents achieve, and gloriously named as heritage-minded parents prefer. Let us sing them out:
Kathleen Anne and Mary Shayla, Michael Leo, Patrick John, Eileen Tracy and Clarke Robert: Pride of Mickie, pride of Don.
The meter would be a bit better off if Clarke Robert were Robert Clarke, but this sextet of future heirs — totally individual, likable and success-bound on their own – will never be better off than they are right now sharing the fortune of love they’ve had from the start.
It’s actually pretty hard to celebrate Don Keough’s recognition as Irish American of the Year and not get a little wet-eyed in the bargain. The man can be — and, hell, often is — an intimidating you know what and a terrifying, demanding. unrelenting pain in the you know where.
He is a monumental self-motivated man – driven is the better word – and without doubt one of the truly great motivators of others, which activity can take many forms. He can speak, ad lib or off-the-cuff, to the troops — words of immediacy, eloquence, urgency and passion — that, transcribed later on, read like they belonged in Fowler’s or were crafted and edited by highly-paid speech writers.
He can scowl you onward to your chores or smile in such a way that you want to scurry even faster. He can scribble brilliantly simple notes like, “Do this now, please,” or write the most gracious letters of praise or thanks that you save in some secret place or show your real boss or send home to mommy, for heaven’s sake. But his happiest moments are not telling you what to do, but getting out of the office and showing you what to do. These are the times when the wise, the lame, the fat and the halt absent themselves from felicity because this magnificent son of the pitchfork is going to march you to a Coca-Cola jet and fly you into combat.He has invited this writer, this more-than-portly pal (whom he likes only because he himself looks so slim, so soldierly and trim next to me) on trips that he has described seductively enough to make a travel agency blush or tempt the Pope to come along.
Except that the Pope and the pal would wind up Day ! too pooped to face tomorrow.
At the end of Day 18, we would be deep in perspiration, panic and prayer. For each other, mind you, not for Don.
Mr. Keough (note the Mister, folks) is a terror on a trip. He revels in forced marches through newly-opened concentrate plants… exhausting, double-time maneuvers up and down and in between high-speed bottling lines… day-and-night chopper flights to distant outposts where the Coca-Cola flag flies proudly, but damp-ly in the sullen, steamy air and a couple of perimeter guards carry 12-gauge Winchester pumps and the celebratory fare is Mr. Keough’s favorite, two huge, handsome pigs perfectly roasted to the specs of the “21” Club and quite capable, thank you, of serving the staff and most of the neighboring countryside for a helluva long while.
On one such trip — Alaska, Pusan, Seoul, Manila, Hong Kong, Wake Island, Maui, San Francisco, Atlanta, New York – this dear seller of a simple little pleasure in the day’s occupation – granted his loyal colleagues neither Saturday nor Sunday to rest or recuperate. (He and I sped to Mass in Manila under armed escort then back to the choppers where I believe my beat-up, blue and red helicopter was mistaken for a Pepsi bogey and took a couple of ground hits from people of impeccable taste.)
And one day in one country in that unceasing pain, that heart-pounding, peripatetic horror, our leader leapt from the lead car of the caravan and shouted, “Follow me!”
We followed Don Keough into the sweatiest, hottest, tin-roofed, tumbledown system of alleyways, foul-smelling alcoves and unlighted shops purveying nothing edible or recognizable to a Madison Avenue chap such as myself. It was scary stuff, a bad movie.
“Stop,” shouted Don. And we did in front of a single four-foot counter behind which was a single, very old, very agile man of Oriental features. Without a word, this fellow reached into a small refrigerator and brought out one absolutely ice-cold Coca-Cola.
“Mista Keoogh!” he said and grinned — enough to light up the place.
“How many you selling?” asked Don.
“Tousand a week,” said the proprietor.
“God bless,” said Don Keough.
They knew each other.
They were friends. He was in Don’s book.
So are we all.
One time recently I heard one of Don’s closest friends propose a toast. “God bless Don Keough,” he said. As we raised glasses of something other than Coke, I know I heard a voice respond: “What do you guys think I’ve been doin’?”
Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in the March April 1993 issue of Irish America. ♦
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