Welcome!

Born in Lowell, Mass on April 16, 1945, Al was one of 12 children in his family.

While growing up, he lived 3 years on a MINK farm in Ipswich, Mass from 1954-1957.  Co-located with that mink farm was a slaughterhouse where racehorse “nags” were processed and used to feed the mink.  His family often made a Sunday dinner out of a choice horsemeat rump roast.  (Not knowing at the time, this was not normal for U. S. families.)

After high school, Al worked for a blasting contractor for a couple years and then entered the Air Force.  He spent 10 years in the Air Force where he was trained to be an electronics technician, and eventually became an electronics instructor (in the classroom) at an Air Force Tech School.

Al left the Air Force to accept a job as a staff technician at a local television station (WCIA-TV) in 1974, working full time and attending school part time (pursuing a degree in electrical engineering).  This led to a position at WNAC-TV/WNEV-TV in Boston where he soon became Engineering Manager.  After almost a decade at the Boston station, Al took a position at the Providence Journal Broadcast Division where he was Vice-President of Engineering, overseeing technical operations of 22 television stations across the country.

During his years as VP of Engineering, Al was also a member of the FCC Advisory Committee for Advanced Television Systems (ACATS).  This group was charged with the responsibility of making a recommendation to the FCC for a digital broadcast standard for HDTV.  That work began in 1989 and was completed in 1994.

Before retirement from broadcasting in 2003, Al worked his final half-dozen years as an engineering consultant, helping TV stations develop conversion strategies for implementing HDTV broadcasting.

Modern Square Dancing came into Al’s life when he took a Mainstream level class in 1999-2000.  He hosted a SD lawn party in the summer of 2001 where the activities included Karaoke singing.  This is when another dancer put a bug in his ear to consider becoming a caller.  He attended a caller school in Sturbridge, Mass in August 2002.  He then became the club caller for two clubs in 2004:  Country Corner Squares in Lyndonville, VT, and Littleton Squares in Littleton, NH.

As a dancer, Al was very interested in higher level choreography.  This led to him joining the Tech Squares SDC at MIT where he danced every Tuesday night for several years.  During those years, he started a club in Worcester that was intended to emulate the MIT model.  That group, The Seven Hills Promenaders, evolved into a Challenge-level club that danced on Wednesday nights.  When COVID-19 came along, that group became a Virtual C3A group that still meets on Wednesday nights.

Al has embraced the new SSD program that CALLERLAB launched in an effort to curb the decaying entry of new dancers into the activity, and to stimulate the retention of those dancers after they learn how to dance.  Offering a shorter destination program, and then offering enjoyable dances in the area, is the approach being advocated by the SSD program.

Al Rouff, and his wife Priscilla, started two SSD clubs in October 2022.