Your 24 year secret answered
I also have an extensive work history, I place the three/maybe four most recent jobs in a common format, describing skills and mroe importantly individual accomplishments at each position.
To list the rest, do just that. Add a page with education and :Other "past experiences", in bullet form.
ie.
1985 - Broadman's Boats (Administrator)
1994 - Clown's cookies (sales manager)
1997 - Bridge's spans(technical sales engineer)
Now you aren't stuck leaving out work experience that may be relevant. Another trick if you have time is to reprint your resume with relevant experiences in your list in bold. It helps when it is scanned, in fact the faster it is read the more it stands out.
When you get the interview, you can refer to that section again when describing relevant past experience.
