Elizabeth Rogers

Life and career

Born Betty Jayne Rogers in Austin, Texas, she played minor characters in thirty-seven episodes of a dozen different prime-time network series, including Little House on the Prairie, Bewitched, Gunsmoke, The Waltons, Marcus Welby, M.D., Dragnet 1966, Mannix, Dragnet 1967, Bonanza, The Time Tunnel, Land of the Giants, Dr. Kildare, and Slattery's People. She had two roles in the original Star Trek television series. She provided the (uncredited) voice for entity known as "The Companion" in the episode "Metamorphosis" (1967). She also portrayed Lt. Palmer, a substitute communications officer, in the episodes "The Doomsday Machine" (1967) and "The Way to Eden" (1969). For Doomsday Machine, Rogers was brought in at the last minute after Nichelle Nichols informed the producers that she was flying to New York for a concert performance. As Nichols had no standard contract she was legally free to do so, but Rogers' appearance was intended to convince her to keep herself available for Star Trek. Rogers said in a later interview, "I got the part when Urura [Nichols] had a singing engagement. I was used as an instant 'threat' replacement."

During the 1970s, she also appeared in a string of Irwin Allen produced films including The Poseidon Adventure (1972) and The Towering Inferno (1974). She was a personal friend of Allen and his wife Sheila Matthews Allen, and was married to actor Erik Nelson (also a regular in Irwin Allen films) in the backyard of Allen's home. Her other film appearances included Bittersweet Love (1976), The Van (1977), Grand Theft Auto (1977), and An Officer and a Gentleman (1982) as David Keith's mother.

She died from multiple strokes and lung cancer on November 6, 2004 in Tarzana, California at the age of 70.