Edward J. Roth brings to ATV experience of working in television in four different countries.

Since he was demobilised as a Sergeant from the United States Marines there have been very few days when this tall — 6ft. 4ins. — American from Boston, Massachusetts, has not turned his hand to some job in television or radio.

On the way up from writing radio scripts to becoming No. 1 executive of a country’s TV and radio — he was Director General of Eire’s TV and radio until joining ATV — he has also gained academic qualifications in the communicative arts, receiving his Bachelor of Science degree from Boston University and becoming a Master of Arts at Columbia. He also gained an Encyclopaedia Britannica scholarship to Penn. State University.

In TV he has been producer, director, floor manager, programme controller, camera-man, sound technician, projectionist and script writer before becoming an executive.

EARLY DAYS

But he started work as a newspaper delivery boy while still at High School. It wasn’t that he liked the job — he just needed the money to continue his education. When the war started he worked as a plumber’s mate in the dockyards, helping refit the destroyers which the United States sent to Britain in the early days of Lease-Lend.

His ambition was to get into the Air Corps but his eyesight was faulty. He saw double owing to a muscle defect and to correct it he wore thick lensed glasses. The glasses did the trick, strengthened the muscles of his eye and eventually he was accepted in the Air Corps and trained for his pilot’s licence.

ACTIVE SERVICE

Later he joined the Marines and went into action in the Solomon Islands. His squadron received commendation after taking part in twenty-one bombing missions in a month.

October 31, 1945 (“I remember the date, even the exact time”) saw the buck sergeant back into civilian clothes again.

He went to Boston University in the day time and Harvard at night. And in what spare time he had, he worked as a mail sorter. After two years studying he received his Bachelor of Science degree. During this time he got his first working knowledge of radio, writing scripts on juvenile delinquency for a series made in co-operation with the FBI and also working on a newsboys’ programme. He continued his studies and in 1950 obtained his Master of Arts degree at Columbia University. Then came a brief stint working at Paramount News in New York and a period working as associated producer on two half-hour motion pictures.

INTO TV

In January 1951 Mr Roth joined the National Broadcasting Corporation of America. His first paycheque he used to meet the maternity hospital bill when his wife Kathleen presented him with their first child, Maureen, a month later.

There followed a succession of jobs for NBC either as a stage manager or associate director. He also produced news and public affairs programmes, and directed baseball OBs.

In 1955 Mr Roth went on behalf of NBC to Notre Dame University in Indiana to start a TV station [WNDU-TV – Ed] that was to become one of the best-known and most highly respected in the United States. He also taught at the university, assisting in the development of their communication arts (TV, radio and films) programme.

Two years in Chicago as programme manager followed on Station WGN (World’s Greatest Newspaper) which was on the air for 20 hours a day, the biggest independent TV station in America with no network.

It was around this time that Mr Roth became interested in international TV and in 1959 he was sent by NBC to help establish a station for Lima in Peru, where he stayed for one year. His work completed, he moved to Mexico City to do the same there, setting up the first two independent stations in the country, one in Guadalajara, the other in Monterrey.

MOVE TO EIRE

When Southern Ireland decided to have television they called in Mr Roth from across the Atlantic. He came with his wife and four children. Only the need to find a house in or around London keeps them all from crossing the Irish Sea, but Mr Roth hopes to solve this problem soon and bring his family; Maureen, now 12, Edward J. III, 10, Bridget, 5 and Lourdes, 2, and his wife Kathleen to England.

Hobbies: “I’ve never really had the time to get into any hobby. I played hockey and football at school.

Reading: At present anything from Variety and TV Times to “Anatomy of Britain”.

Religion: Roman Catholic. Politics: Democrat. He was director of the party’s public relations in Massachusetts and ran a radio campaign for Truman there in 1948.

“I am extremely pleased about joining ATV to work with Mr Grade. Both ATV and Mr Grade have international reputations, so you may well imagine how excited I was when Mr Grade asked me to join him and work for a company of which I had heard such a great deal on both sides of the Atlantic”.

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TELEVISION history was made last month—and ATV helped to make it, writes NORMAN HARE. Operation Telstar—providing a TV link across the Atlantic has proved, without any doubt, that when it comes to the big occasion ATV can meet it. In the many thousands of words which have been written about the occasion little mention has been made of the ITV contributions to its success. And because of an agreement between the companies not to seek individual publicity, no mention at all has been made of the skilled operators and facilities provided by ATV.

On the memorable Monday night when viewers in the United States looked-in on Europe, ATV provided the major contribution to the British programme.

An Outside Broadcasts unit was in Cornwall televising the launching of The Lizard lifeboat and another was in London providing night scenes with the Houses of Parliament as the focus of attention.

Tony Flanagan was the producer in charge in Cornwall with John Appleby as supervisory engineer. The pictures were fed into the GPO transmitter at Goonhilly in two “hops” by Links Dept men under Harry Angus.

Steve Wade produced the Company’s contribution in London with “Tiny” Crane in charge of engineering.

Sharing overall production responsibility with a BBC man in the whole of the London ITV/BBC contribution was Alan Chivers and at the nerve centre — the International Control Room at the BBC — sat Bill Ward and Len Mathews, the two men who, more than any others in ITV, had contributed towards the success of the operation. On the nights of the experimental transmissions and receptions, July 10-11, Company facilities were also used.

John Harrison was at Goonhilly operating the Mobile Ampex recording unit and put on record that first flickering picture which excited millions of viewers who had stayed up until lam to see the experiment. In the back of the van was the sound equipment which brought to ITV viewers the voice of Ian Trethowan the commentator. Here, John Appleby was in charge.

A behind-the-scenes crisis occurred when the rotary converter which the Company had sent to Goonhilly showed a bearing fault.

Without this aid the conversion from the English 50 cycles to the American 60 cycles would have been impossible and this would have placed the whole Telstar operation in jeopardy, so far as British participation was concerned.

An emergency call to London got our new diesel generator on the road heading for Cornwall as quickly as it could be driven by Geoffrey Humbling, accompanied by fitter Eric Griffiths. They left at teatime on Monday, drove 332 miles through the night and arrived at Goonhilly at 10 am on the Tuesday when Telstar went into orbit. They were later joined by fitter-driver Cyril Penfold.

Another ATV contribution to Telstar was the 20-minute film produced by Phil Wrestler and shown to viewers on both the Tuesday and Wednesday nights of the experiment.

Cameramen were Alan Harries and Mike Whittcutt at Westminster and Dave Higgon at The Lizard. Sound was handled by Ron Harding at The Lizard and Len Penfold, John Parker and Dave Ashley-Smith at Westminster. The backroom staff:— Dave Haley (Managing Engineer, Communications), Freddie Dix (Managing Engineer, OBs), Ross Compton (OB Planning Manager), Brian Longman and Ralph Taylor.

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WHAT type of man is the new Chairman of the Company, Sir Robert Renwick, Bart., K.B.E.; stockbroker, company director, pioneer of Independent Television and chairman of the newly formed British Space Development Company?

He has been described in the newspapers as “tough”, “shrewd”, “enthusiastic”, “hard-working” and “a man fanatically interested in what he is going to do next”.

He is 57 — his birthday was the fourth of this month — has five grandchildren, one son and three daughters. He does most of his work from a small office down a lane off Threadneedle Street and spends most of his spare time at his country cottage at Winkfield, Berks.

Most mornings of the week Sir Robert takes a ninepenny ride on the Underground from Marble Arch to the Bank.

BY TUBE

“I go by tube because it is the best means of communication in London at that particular time of the day” he says. On the subject of communication Sir Robert can be considered to have expert knowledge. During the war he was Controller of Communications, Air Ministry and Controller of Communications Equipment, Ministry of Aircraft Production.

He played a big part in setting up the vast radar network which ringed Britain during the vital years of the struggle for supremacy in the air and the radar system later used to such good effect in the offensive by Bomber Command. He was also chairman of the Airborne Forces Committee which directed the fitting out of Britain’s airborne expeditions.

When the war ended Sir Robert returned to the great County of London Electricity Supply Company, founded by his father, Sir Harry Renwick. But these were the days of nationalization and when the Government took over electricity Sir Robert resigned his chairmanship and turned to other interests.

He saw the great potentials of television, both as a form of entertainment and a means of communication. And he resented greatly the monopoly which the Government had vested in the BBC to run the country’s TV service.

Long before ITV was ever talked about in the lobbies at Westminster, long before the term “commercials” ever crept into the vocabulary of the advertising fraternity, Sir Robert and Mr Charles Orr Stanley, who is also an ATV director, campaigned for an independent television service. They received a powerful ally in Mr Norman Collins — now ATV’s Deputy Chairman — who had resigned from the top post in television at the BBC.

FIRST COMPANY

They joined in forming the Associated Broadcasting Development Company in August 1952, the first commercial television company to be created in Britain.

As early as 1947 Sir Robert, as President of the Television Society had urged the Government to give TV more financial support or agree to have commercial programmes on the BBC for a trial period.

When nowadays they casually switch channels for alternative entertainment few viewers remember the tremendous battle the early advocates of ITV had to get them that privilege. Powerful interests were waged against them and at no time could they rally the kind of prestige support which the BBC and anti-ITVers could command.

ACTIVE MEMBER

Sir Robert and his colleagues eventually won the day. ITV came on the air in September 1955 and ATV, the company which had grown out of the original ABDC, helped to provide the first programmes. In the six years of its development Sir Robert has always been an active member. He, Mr Val Parnell, and Mr Lew Grade constitute the executive committee responsible for the day-to-day running of the company.

Now Sir Robert has become the occupant of the chair vacated by Mr Prince Littler, who will continue to serve on the board. He brings to the chairmanship an expert’s knowledge of company affairs. He has twenty other directorships and is chairman of the British Relay Wireless and Television Company Ltd., and the Reliance-Clifton Cables and Industrial Products Co. Ltd.

He is also deputy-chairman of the Institute of Directors, an organization he has helped to build up from a membership of 450 in 1948 to 37,000.

SINCERE BELIEF

He has a sincere belief in the future of television and of ATV in particular. He is a man of vision — a man who has his feet firmly on the ground but has his eyes on the space above us.

“This world of space is to be conquered” he says. “We can only begin to envisage the future that lies ahead in the atmosphere. It is the real Eldorado of the future. The money in space is more than any man ever dreamed of and the future gentlemen of space have a much bigger chance of vast wealth than ever did the adventurers of the Hudson Bay and East India Companies.

“So far as television is concerned we are now only at the bow and arrow stage. Satellites 22,300 miles high will, sooner or later, make world-wide television possible.

“There is no question at all that space communications will come. The language of space communications will be English — and, if we will take the initiative, the centre of communications will continue to be England”.

A BIG POWER

Sir Robert sees this country as a big power in the realms above the clouds providing we grasp our opportunities.

With so much business to attend to, Sir Robert finds little time for relaxation but most nights he drives home to his cottage where he reads the papers, watches television and then goes off for a walk in the fields with his poodle Benjamin.

Sir Robert has decided views about television. He has been very impressed with the work of the company’s engineers and technical staff whose recent exhibition he visited. He thinks technically the industry may have gone ahead of its programmes.

Programmes, he believes, could do with a good deal of improvement. Of personal preferences he says:

“I like Westerns and plays that don’t leave you in mid-air when they end. I believe that most viewers like a good story told in dramatic form without the author trying to be too clever.

ORIGINAL MATERIAL

“Outside Broadcasts, such as our recent visit to the circus, make wonderful television and sport is excellent to watch. I’m not overfond of old films as I think we should produce more original material for television. Series such as “Danger Man” are fine.”

As for the 625-405 line controversy, Sir Robert has had his mind made up longer than most people have had television sets. When TV was restarted after the war he supported Lord Cherwell in the view that it was wrong to go back to 405.

Sir Robert gives the impression of being a man who can completely lake command of any given situation, a man of integrity and purpose who would neither suffer fools gladly nor be impressed by the charlatan. His experience in commerce and industry has convinced him of the great value of concerted effort.

TEAMWORK COUNTS

“It is teamwork that counts — and will count in the future of ATV” he says. “If you are talking to men you know and have faith in, you can get something done in half an hour that would take all day to accomplish with virtual strangers. You must have a good team and inspire them — make them feel that they are doing something worthwhile.”

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LESLIE ABBOTT, Head of Contracts and Copyrights arrived at Gt Cumberland Place via a stockbroker’s office, Broadway and Tin Pan Alley.

For as many years as most people remember the name of Abbott has been associated with music publishing and when Leslie, dissatisfied with working in the City, joined the firm of Francis Day and Hunter he was following a family tradition.

After a year in Denmark Street he went to America to work for Irving Berlin, his main object being to gain experience, because in those days American songs were sweeping the world.

Leslie started song plugging. It meant working until three or four o’clock in the morning visiting the clubs and hotels where artistes were appearing making sure that the song he was plugging was on their minds — and lips. He was the only Englishman in the organization and had to take a good deal of ribbing. Paul Whiteman used to stop whatever his band was playing when Leslie arrived and start up with “Here Come the British”, a popular number at the time.

Show Friends

Back from America, Leslie joined Chappells and continued plugging songs, but with all the experience he had got from mastering the American method. When Radio Luxembourg opened up he joined the organization in charge of copyright.

The war started and into the RAF went Leslie and he was fortunate enough to be posted to Blackpool where he met up with many of his friends in show business.

He was in England a year and then went overseas to South Africa. At the end of the war he was the Adjutant at the Headquarters, RAF, S. Africa at Pretoria.

Demobbed, Leslie went straight back into music again rejoining his first firm Francis Day and Hunter in an administrative capacity. Eventually he became a director of the company but resigned in 1952 to become managing director of the Southern Music Company.

Three years later commercial television appeared on the horizon and he joined what was then ABDC [Associated Broadcasting Development Company – Ed], the forerunner of ATV, on April 4 1955 to look after contracts and copyright. Or at least that was what was written on his contract. Actually it turned out to be much more. In those early days everyone joined in setting up a TV organization that would work and he found himself hiring rehearsal rooms, reading scripts, negotiating with the Musicians’ Union and making arrangements with the Performing Rights Society in addition to a hundred and one other jobs. The Personnel Dept came under his wing for some time.

Lucky Escape

Those early days were interesting, absorbing and at times not without risk. He recalls the occasion when he was at Wood Green when the dressing room roof was being removed. As he walked through the stage door half a ton of concrete fell immediately behind him, missing him by inches. “You really shouldn’t have come through here” explained the foreman.

Leslie didn’t wait to explain that he very nearly didn’t.

Nowadays life is full of copyrights, contracts, and agreements and there is not much time for song. But Leslie Abbott still has a great affection for the world of music.

He believes that despite the near-monopolization of the “pop” world by the Americans, Britain has still a good deal to sing about. Our composers are far ahead of any in the world when it comes to writing light music of the type that gets played again and again for several years, as distinct from the “overnight” successes and failures in the Hit Parade.

His Favourites

At 50, Leslie Abbott can look back on a life full of music and entertainment. He is a friend of hundreds of stars. Married in 1938, he now has a 19-year-old son who is an assistant TV time buyer with a big company. His home is at Brookman’s Park.

Leslie has one passion in his spare time — motor racing, and he goes to most of the big meetings. Naturally, he likes to listen to music, and if asked to choose his favourite numbers he would probably plump for some of Gilbert and Sullivan’s works. He has one pet aversion — parodies of good music.

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Bernard Bibby is one of the men who, on that memorable night of September 22, 1955 when ATV first went on the air, [jointly with Associated-Rediffusion; they began their own transmissions on Saturday 24 – Ed] kept his fingers crossed and hoped that the “string and sealing wax” improvisations would survive.

He had joined the company from the BBC in June, as deputy to Terence McNamara [sic – name given as Macnamara in his staff profile in an earlier edition], and had to tackle the tremendous task of getting things to work at Wood Green. In 10 weeks he and his colleagues did what it would have taken about 18 months to do back at the BBC.

“Everyone worked like blazes to get Wood Green equipped properly for the opening night’s show ‘Channel Nine’” he says. “The equipment arrived in bits and pieces. Sometimes it wasn’t addressed to us at all but we grabbed it. I doubt if any of us got more than three hours sleep a night in the week before the start of programmes”.

Now, having left engineering to become Production Facilities Controller with the Elstree, Foley Street, Highbury and Wood Green studios to deal with Mr Bibby usually gets a normal night’s rest. But there are still plenty of tough problems to be solved every week. At 37, he is responsible for everything that goes into the studios apart from the electronics.

Bernard Bibby has always been interested in making things work. As a boy in North West Lancashire he dabbled in radio sets, motor bikes, cine-projectors and anything electrical or mechanical.

Some time later Bernard turned his talent to motor bikes and in 1948 he was roaring around the famous Isle of Man circuit touching 115 miles an hour on his Norton as a competitor in the Junior Tourist Trophy Race.

Nowadays he finds time for more relaxing hobbies in his lovely home high on the Hog’s Back in Surrey. It is a converted stable block and a good deal of the conversion he is doing himself including the digging of a wine cellar, which has a certain amount of fame in ATV, not to mention popularity, and a swimming pool in the garden.

In the cellar he keeps more than 1,000 bottles of wine and just now he’s very pleased with some ’57 and ’59 burgundies and clarets which he bottled himself. They’ll be fully matured in about 10 years time, but, as visitors to Little Down know, there are plenty of other wines there which taste very good at present.

Bottling wine, keeping bees and playing the harpsichord are amongst the ways in which Bernard Bibby relaxes away from television. His interest in wine came when, in his own words, he “got fed up with drinking the beer served up by the pubs soon after the war”. His interest in the harpsichord came through a fascination with 16th and 17th century music. He has two — both Kirckmans.

Mr Bibby has spent all his working life in radio or television. He joined the BBC in 1948 to work in the Recording Department. He was in London, Manchester, Bristol and Bangor at various periods and met his wife in the BBC’s Recording section. When television re-started after the war Mr Bibby went to Alexandra Palace on “racks”.

Then came the move to Lime Grove where Mr Bibby became a Technical Operations Manager. He occupied this post until joining ATV at Regent House when the early staff were being recruited.

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THE qualifications required to become a competent company secretary are precisely laid down in the textbooks. They do not include playing rugby, squash or sailing your own 14-foot International dinghy. No mention is made of studying engineering, stage managing musicals or digging up mines in the desert.

But this is the kind of experience that provides the background for 41-year-old JACK BARHAM to work with efficiency and skill as the secretary to Associated Television. Being a qualified chartered accountant can also come in useful, by the way.

In his job Mr Barham has to combine the precision of an expert on company practice with the enthusiasm of an adventurer in a new medium of entertainment.

Jack Barham’s functions range from recording the minutes of the board meetings to solving personal problems of members of the staff.

There are many times when he has to have both the skill of the chess player and the optimistic anticipation of the man with only one number to go for a fullhouse at Bingo.

One important factor that makes him well-liked throughout the company is that he always is very approachable.

Born at Woodbridge, Suffolk, the son of a local solicitor, Jackson Barham was studying engineering when the war came. He left London University for the Army to serve in the Royal Engineers.

In North Africa he found himself engaged in the delicate task of avoiding being blown up by mines and preventing the same thing happening to the advance troops of the First Army.

His field company cleaned-up vast stretches of desert territory prior to the push into Tunis, but one little stretch almost cleaned up Jack Barham.

A mine that exploded at the wrong time sent him back to Blighty on a stretcher.

When the war ended Mr Barham decided he would become an accountant. The fact that the firm to whom he was articled did a good deal of work in show business was probably the first signpost along the road that led him into television.

Qualified as an accountant, he joined the Stoll Theatre Group, but in order to gain practical experience he worked at first as a stage-manager.

Some time later he was appointed Personal Assistant to Mr Prince Littler who was to become the chairman of ATV.

Jack Barham came into ATV in January 1956.

At that time there were less than 100 ATV shareholders. Now there are more than 15,000, and a host of subsidiary companies scattered throughout the world which Mr Barham has helped to form.

With so much business to attend to he has little chance these days of taking part in the sports at which he showed so much promise in his younger days. Rugby and athletics are out, although he plays regularly squash and occasionally gets a chance of sailing.

But it’s pottering about the garden at his home in Purley that takes up most of his leisure time. He has a 15-year-old daughter and 12-year-old son, and a wife named Nora, who no doubt sometimes speculates on how much more ordered family life would have been if her loving husband had gone back to civil engineering after the war.

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