Jere passed away unexpectedly on July 28, 2022 at home in Dallas. He was 74 years old.
Jere was born on January 23, 1948, to Barbara (Lee) and Robert Leonard Cudd in New York City. His childhood and early school years were spent in New York, where Jere’s father served for many years as Executive Vice President of the Trust Department at Chase Bank and in Darien, Connecticut, where his parents maintained a summer home large enough to contain a rambunctious family of three children. Jere was the youngest child. He and his older brother, Robert, were less than two years apart in age and enjoyed a close relationship growing up. The brothers spent their formative years under the tutelage of the estimable Maude Mathieson, whose experience as a registered nurse gave her the calm demeanor and skill required to raise two active boys. The brothers called her “Mason” and regarded her as a family member, maintaining a relationship with her long after they were grown.
Jere and Robert both received their early education at The Buckley School in New York City. The Buckley School was founded in 1933 by Isabelle Buckley as an independent institution offering education for students from kindergarten through 9th grade based on a plan that emphasized academics, arts, athletics, and ethics. After school, the brothers participated in the Knickerbocker Greys, a youth cadet corps. The corps was founded in 1881, originally for the sons of veteran Union Army officers. Albert Lindley Lee, the boys’ great-grandfather, was a brigadier general in the Union Army. The corps offers training and experience to both boys and girls in leadership roles, such as squad leaders, company commanders, and staff officers. Cadets develop skills in motivating, supervising, and commanding a group of peers. As they learn new skills, it is traditional for older cadets to pass on their knowledge to junior members.
Jere attended high school at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire. He graduated from Lafayette College, in Easton, Pennsylvania, with a B.A. degree and did post-graduate work at Brown University, in Providence, Rhode Island, where he earned a M.A. degree, and at the University of Paris, La Sorbonne, in Paris, where he also received a M.A. His undergraduate and graduate education was primarily in liberal arts, which helped him develop a facility for speaking and reading in foreign languages, particularly French, German, and Russian. His Russian language skills were further developed by attending language classes in the Soviet Union on a trip to that country in 1972. After that trip, he was employed by the United States Information Agency (USIA), which promoted American culture to the Russians by offering exhibits on aspects of American life in various cities throughout Russia. Jere was part of the team that in 1973 presented an exhibit called “Outdoor Recreation – USA,” which showed how Americans enjoyed camping, swimming, skating, and other activities, with emphasis on the national park system.
After his post-graduate training and experience with the USIA, Jere was recruited by the private sector, where his knowledge of foreign languages and ease in understanding and explaining new technological developments made him a valuable member, initially of IBM World Trade and subsequently of the international division of Hewlett-Packard. He worked abroad several years for each company, based first in Munich and then in Vienna, primarily serving customers in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe.
Jere’s life was characterized by a desire for knowledge and acquiring the means to apply that knowledge. It was no surprise to those who know him that he would tire of marketing computer systems. He returned to the U.S. with the belief that he needed to change careers and that the new career should be medicine. He applied and was accepted at the age of 39 by the University of San Antonio to become a doctor. He graduated from medical school in 1992 and spent a year in a family practice residency at a hospital in Dallas. His intent to pursue a new career in medicine was interrupted by the need to assist his mother through a lengthy treatment for a serious illness, which ended with her passing. Jere realized that, after this interruption, continuation of his medical career would require reapplying to another residency program without any assurance of acceptance.
He reviewed other opportunities to use his skills and settled on teaching, particularly focusing on a program known as English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) at community colleges. He began teaching classes at Brookhaven College in Dallas in the spring of 2004 as an adjunct faculty member and was engaged by the college to teach most winter and spring semesters from 2004 to 2020. His classes were popular with the ESOL students, who consistently awarded him outstanding ratings as a teacher. One of the comments made by a program administrator at the college summarized Jere’s appeal to the students. His classes provided to many of his students the unique experience of learning English from a teacher who spoke their native language well.
Throughout his life, Jere made friends with people of different cultures wherever he traveled and was often able to maintain those friendships for years as changes in his and their lives permitted. Included in the group Jere joined in 1972 to take Russian language classes in the Soviet Union was Corrine Steeger, a young woman newly graduated from the University of Texas at Austin. Jere and Corrine enjoyed their time together and kept in touch after the trip ended. For the next several years, they saw each other on vacations and at other times as their individual careers permitted. When both their careers became fixed in Dallas, their personal and professional lives combined permanently. Together, they adopted three cats, Buddy, Nikko, and Dusty, who adored playing with Jere.
Jere often spent time outside of work in the company of friends, engaging in lively conversation over a meal or playing a game of chess or backgammon. He enjoyed listening to a wide variety of music, from classical to jazz to rock, and took great pleasure in introducing family and friends to different types of music by making recordings for them from his collection. In addition to music, he was a collector of books, coins, wine, and matchbooks from his travels. He became a devoted fan of both the Dallas Cowboys and the Dallas Mavericks while living in his adopted city and insisted that screaming at the teams during televised games was an effective form of encouragement. He lived life to the fullest and shared his enthusiasm for living with a worldwide community of family, friends, and acquaintances.
Jere was predeceased by his parents, Robert and Barbara Cudd. In addition to Corrine, Jere is survived by his sister, Wendy Lee Pile, his brother and sister-in-law, Robert and Nancy Cudd, their three daughters, Elizabeth, Anne, and Victoria, and their families.
A memorial service for Jere will be held at 3 pm on Tuesday, September 13th, in Dallas at Sparkman-Crane Funeral Home. Directions and other details can be found at www.sparkman-crane.com
Condolence to the family may also be left at the website. In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation to your local Humane Society or other favorite animal shelter.
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