Loud, 85, was a teacher for more than 60 years, doing everything from teaching history and math at Hillsdale School in Cincinnati to tutoring math at Northwood School after his retirement in 2021. Loud joined North Country School/Camp Treetops as a faculty member in 1970, acted as school director from 1982-1992 and served on the school’s board of trustees from 1994 to 2022. Loud began teaching math at Northwood in 1992.

Loud also co-founded Camp Gawee in 1964 and began the Treetops West program in 1974 to provide immersive mountaineering experiences for teenagers.

North Country School and Northwood School faculty and staff remember Loud as wearing many hats. He was a mentor to new and old colleagues alike; he was family to those who needed it; he was hilarious in a dry, over-your-head kind of way; and he was a born teacher, right up until the end.

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A second father

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Many people at North Country School and Northwood School knew and loved Loud, though North Country School art teacher Katie Weaver and her family had a special connection with him. Weaver’s father, Harry Eldridge, met Loud at Camp Treetops when they were just 10 years old. The boys were “joined at the hip” from then on, Weaver said, even acting as each other’s best men at their weddings.

When Eldrige and Weaver’s mother, Betty, took over North Country School from Weaver’s grandparents and school founders Walter and Leonora Clark in the 1960s, Loud was working in Cincinnati, Ohio. Harry encouraged Loud to come to North Country School and the Adirondacks, Weaver said, and he did.

Weaver grew up playing with Loud’s children and watching Loud and her dad bag all 46 High Peaks summer after summer as part of Camp Gawee.

“My childhood was wrapped around Roger Loud,” Weaver said.

Loud taught Weaver math at Northwood, and he taught her how to climb. But when Weaver’s father died when she was 19, Loud stepped into an even bigger role in Weaver’s life.

“He was like my second father,” she said. “He was a great person, just to rely on for a whole bunch of different things you go through when you lose a parent.”

She said it was hard to continue on after her father’s death, since her mother didn’t parent her and her siblings well, but Loud was always there with anything the family needed.

“He pretty much just took me under his wing,” she said.

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An outdoorsman

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Loud’s greatest love, outside of teaching and his family, was the mountains. It was such an undying love that Loud penned it in his obituary, which North Country School Executive Director Todd Ormiston said Loud wrote a few years before his death.

Loud is well-remembered for being a 46er 12 times over. But Loud didn’t just love the outdoors alone — he loved to share the outdoors with kids as a form of education through Camp Treetops, Camp Treetops West and Camp Gawee.

Weaver said her relationship with Loud was centered in nature and climbing, from the Adirondacks to California. As a teenager, Weaver hiked the 16 highest peaks in the continental U.S. with Loud as part of the Camp Treetops West program.

Ormiston said one of his colleagues, who wrote a notice of Loud’s death, called the teacher “a mountain of a man.” To Ormiston, that said it all.

“That’s saying so much in a few words because the mountains were so important to him,” he said, “and he was this huge presence, too, without telling you he was.”

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The Loud machine

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“You’ve reached the Loud machine. If you lost your dog, press the pound key.”

Roger Loud might have been one of the last people left in Lake Placid who kept his landline connected. His refusal to buy a smartphone or log onto email was a treat for those who called his landline, got no answer and heard that day’s quippy answering machine message. That’s just one of the ways people remember Loud expressing his tremendous “wit.”

Loud did his New York Times crossword puzzles in pen, and he was well-read.

“He wore out all the books in the library, I think,” Northwood School Senior Master and Director of Alumni Relations Steve Reed said.

Loud had degrees from Amherst College and the University of Cincinnati, and he was known for using his smarts not only to teach math but also to make people laugh. Reed said Loud made math classes, which can be dry, “incredibly fun and funny.” When he handed back AP math prep tests to students who did poorly, they’d find an application to McDonald’s stapled to the back. Not as a dig — just as a way to lighten the bad mood a lackluster grade can bring.

Loud was also known for his “particular genius” of introducing the seniors at Northwood’s commencement ceremony each year. Reed said the class of 2009 — “Oh nein” — got a particularly playful introduction.

“He made everything fun,” Reed said.

Ormiston remembers Loud as being funny, even in their final moments together. Ormiston said he asked Loud how he was doing the last time they saw each other, to which Loud replied: “Well, the worst part is it takes two hands to pick up my beer now.”

“He was a Budweiser guy, ’til the end,” Ormiston said.

Loud was also a fan of nickel dime poker games. He started a weekly poker night that lasted more than 20 years. Around the poker table sat mostly North Country School and Northwood School faculty and staff, and Runyon said Loud had to coordinate between work schedules and find the night everyone could meet without conflict. That’s Tuesday right now, by the way. And even though Loud isn’t around the table anymore, Runyon said his poker nights will continue on at South Meadow Farm.

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A mentor

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Loud had a way of helping people realize their goals. Ben Runyon, who was a teacher at North Country School and Northwood Schools for 31 years, said he got his start in teaching from Loud.

“He took a flier on me right out of college, and he was my greatest mentor my whole career,” Runyon said.

Runyon spent 13 years at North Country School, and when he had gotten tired of his administrative work there, he sought Loud’s advice again. Loud, who had since moved on to teaching at Northwood, told Runyon there was an opening there for a math teacher. Runyon applied and got the job. He said Loud continued to act as his mentor during his time at Northwood. And when Loud passed on his leadership of Camp Treetops West, it was Runyon who took over for the next three years. Loud was a mentor in and out of the classroom, Runyon said.

That’s not an uncommon story.

Jeff Martin was also working at North Country School when he went to one of Loud’s poker nights. He told Loud he wanted a new job, and now Martin has been teaching math at Northwood for more than 25 years. Loud taught Martin “a ton” about teaching math to kids, he said.

Loud was a leader among the faculty at Northwood, according to Martin. He said Loud operated on a philosophy of building camaraderie and making “that human connection with people.” He said Loud mentored old and new faculty, and he said the support that Loud fostered at the school has likely been the reason so many teachers have stayed on for so long.

Reed said Loud’s voice was “incredibly well-respected” by faculty and students alike.

“Roger was a very taciturn man,” Reed said. “He didn’t say much, but when he spoke, everybody hung on his every word to see what he thought about whatever subject was in discussion.”

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Beyond the call

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Loud retired from teaching in 2021, but he still sat in the Northwood School library on Mondays through Fridays to offer math tutoring services to kids who needed the help.

Loud always went above and beyond for his students, and it showed. His students came back with AP test results that were “out of sight,” according to Runyon, and he often led faculty in student test scores. However, Loud did have a particular disdain for geometry, Runyon said — so if you went to Loud for geometry help, it’s likely you ended up talking to Runyon.

Ormiston said he still remembers meeting Loud in his interview for the executive director position, and he could immediately tell how much Loud cared about the camp, the school community and all of the people involved.

“He came up to me and introduced himself and he immediately had this engaging and disarming way about him,” Ormiston said, “where he looks you in the eye, he asks how you’re doing and you can tell he really cares.”

Ormiston thought his level of care came from 80 years of Loud being active in that educational community — as a camper and counselor at Camp Treetops, director of North Country School, a parent at Northwood, and especially as a teacher.

Ormiston said that when his daughter, who attended Northwood School, was having trouble with math last year, Loud came over to their house and tutored her.

Weaver said that Loud left his position as headmaster at North Country School for a teaching position at Northwood because he missed passing on knowledge to students. He was passionate about teaching, and he wanted more contact with kids than he had being at the top.

“He was always a teacher,” Ormiston said.

Loud is survived by his wife, Patricia; his four children, David Roger Loud, Jennifer Vann, Patrick George Loud and Brigit Loud; and his grandson, Bodie.