MORSE is engraved on his memory…
Meet Keith Rogers, ATV’s operations controller


Keith Rogers, ATV’s Operations Controller has had a varied background.
In his teens he was a wireless operator on board a Fleet Reserve oil tanker during the first World War. Bom in London, Mr Rogers attended Mill Hill School. When he left school the exciting new world of wireless, just opening up, beckoned him.
In 1917 he joined the Marconi Company as a wireless operator. “Sometimes now, after all those years, if I happen to hear a snatch of Morse code on the radio I automatically translate it,” he says.
After two years at sea, Mr Rogers continued working for the Marconi Company until 1922.
Mr Rogers was with a radio technical journal until 1935 when he started to write freelance articles on scientific subjects for Fleet Street.
“I was aware of developments in television quite early,” he says. “I had written articles about Baird and I had been carrying out experiments on the reception of television on cathode ray tubes with the Edison Swan Company.”
When war came in 1939, he was commissioned in the R.A.F. and was concerned in the installation of radar in Britain. It was then that he first met Mr. Philip Dorté, now ATV Midlands Controller.
After the war he rejoined the Marconi Company, in their television and radar department. He supervised radar installations in Denmark.
Then, by chance, he met Philip Dorté again. “Why not join the BBC as an outside broadcasts producer?” he suggested. Mr Rogers took his advice.
“I enjoyed the work tremendously. Television outside broadcasts are a form of reporting and I had done plenty of journalistic work in the past.
“During my last few years with the BBC, as Senior OB Producer, I was responsible for organising the Royal broadcasts.”
When ATV started in 1956, he was one of the first to join the Company. His job then was head of the Outside Broadcasts Department. After a few months he was asked to take charge of Operations.
This was a challenge, for commercial television on the British pattern had not been tried anywhere else in the world.
Mr Rogers helped to thrash out networking details with the other contractors to establish the practice necessary for networking to function efficiently.
“I thrive on a sense of urgency,” says Mr Rogers. “We feel this strongly in Operations because we are always working against the clock.”
Mr Rogers’ department is responsible for the cohesion of everything transmitted by ATV.
That includes the transmission of live and recorded programmes, preparation and transmission of films, the insertion of commercials, announcements, weather forecasts, station identification and promotion of forthcoming programmes.
Everything is timed to the second by clocks synchronised with TIM.
Although his job leaves little time for hobbies, Mr Rogers enjoys gardening at his Haywards Heath, Sussex home. He is married with one son, who is a doctor.
About the author
'ATV Newsheet' was the monthly staff newsletter for employees of Associated TeleVision in London and the Midlands