JOEL - That speech was given in 1931 and was in reference to this earth. Here is a link to it:

http://eyring.hplx.net/Eyring/faq/evolution/Talmage1931.html

What Talmage said was:
"Geologists and anthropologists say that if the beginning of Adamic history dates back but 6000 years or less, there must have been races of human sort upon earth long before that time -- without denying, however, that Adamic history may be correct, if it be solely regarded solely as the history of the Adamic race." (The Earth and Man)

There were some early church leaders like Talmage and B.H. Roberts and other non-LDS scholars who, in attempts to harmonize scripture and doctrine with science, proposed that there might have been earlier races of humanoids who some called Pre-Adamites, but unrelated to Adam.

Talmage said:
"I do not regard Adam as related to -- certainly not as descended from -- the Neanderthal, the Cro-Magnon, the Peking or the Piltdown man. Adam came as divinely directed, created and empowered, and stands as the patriarchal head of his posterity."(The Earth and Man)

He also said:
"I do not believe that Adam derived his mortal body by evolutionary processes from the lower animals. The adamic race of men are of an entirely different order." (Talmage to F. C. Williamson, 22 Apr. 1933, Talmage Papers. (88))

Elder Marion G. Romney pointed out that LDS theology commits us to certain beliefs regarding Adam and Adam's line:
"There were no pre-adamic men in the line of Adam. ... I am not a scientist. I do not profess to know anything but Jesus Christ, and him crucified, and the principles of his gospel. If, however, there are some things in the strata of the earth indicating there were men before Adam, they were not the ancestors of Adam. Adam was the son of God. ... He did not come up through an unbroken line of organic evolution. There had to be a fall. 'Adam fell that men might be." (2 Nephi 2:25.) (Conference Report, April 5, 1953)

Scientific discovery so far seems to indicate that life and death occurred thousands and even millions of years before the time of Adam. So there is of course an obvious dilemma when we consider the possible existance and deaths of these so-called pre-adamic races and other animals and plant life, and the doctrine that there was no death on this earth before Adam. It will have to remain a dilemma until God sees fit to give us further light on the subject, which we know will happen some day:
"Yea, verily I say unto you, in that day when the Lord shall come, he shall reveal all things--things which have passed, and hidden things which no man knew, things of the earth, by which it was made, and the purpose and the end thereof--things most precious, things that are above, and things that are beneath, things that are in the earth, and upon the earth, and in heaven." (D&C 101:32-34.)