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Teacher, Hiker, Backpacker, Artist

Jane Rondthaler ’52

September 11, 2025

Jane was a teacher, hiker, backpacker, artist, and mother who used her skills to better the world. She studied general literature at Reed College, writing her thesis—“Sophocles: Oedipus the King, a Translation”—with advising by Professor Donald N. Levin [classics 1954–55].

Jane’s early childhood memories include cherished visits to a family beach house, where, as the youngest grandchild, she spent happy hours sitting in her grandmother’s lap, listening to Winnie-the-Pooh stories. As an older child, living in Charlotte, North Carolina, she discovered a field of horses and learned to ride, an activity she loved.

Eventually, Jane was awarded a full-year scholarship to the Portland Museum of Art school, a time of learning which she cherished during her long life. She eventually earned her Master of Education from Portland State University.

Jane taught fourth grade at Catlin Gabel School, also co-leading an outdoor program of hiking and backpacking trips that culminated in an annual Mt. Hood climb. Students and friends will remember her Bernie Packer cartoons, a series about a mop-headed backpacker and climber facing the wilds with humor. She led many backpacking trips for the Sierra Club in California, Washington, Montana, and Canada on her summer breaks. Always a music lover, she joined the school’s Community Choir and helped create a recorder trio that played at the school concerts as well as at the annual Spring Festival of the Arts.

During the years that followed, Jane continued exploring the outdoors, taking annual backpacking trips and hiking weekly with friends. She always had a small notebook with her for sketching things she had seen so she could learn more about them: flowers, animals, rocks, alpine lakes, and the geology of the mountains all intrigued her.

Jane loved spending time with family, including seven grandchildren. She taught them camping and hiking skills, music appreciation, art, math, and myriad other interests she had pursued in her life: geology, archaeology, birding, the history of mountaineering, the joy of nature and of small things.

While on one of her many beloved geological volunteering trips to Death Valley in the early 2000’s, Jane discovered an ancient rock art formation that wasn’t in the comprehensive book she carried with her. She sketched a picture of it, paced out basic measurements, and took compass readings. Once back from her hike, she showed the park archaeologist her sketch. He was thrilled and asked if Jane could lead him to it, and by any chance, could she ride a horse? She proudly rode out the next morning and showed them the formation. The piece of rock art was added to the California State archaeological records, with Jane’s name alongside it.

A lifelong learner, Jane was rarely without the most recent issue of The New Yorker, even when dementia robbed her of the ability to read. She is survived by her daughters, Elizabeth, Catherine, and Mary.

Appeared in Reed magazine: Fall 2026

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