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It would not be an understatement to say that those of us who live on the Peninsula are influenced by living in close proximity to Stanford University. It is the incubator of Silicon Valley and its technology innovations, a leader in medical research, a major landowner and for many, an employer or alma mater. Which makes it all the more fascinating to know that this important institution would not exist at all if not for the death of a teenaged boy, Leland Stanford Jr., in 1884.
It was the loss of their only child that impelled Jane and Leland Stanford to create a university that bore his name and to declare that “the children of California will be our children.”
For Jane Stanford, the most important memorial to her son was the Leland Stanford Junior Museum, which opened in 1893. Young Leland was a collector of everything from Greek and Roman antiquities to curios and keepsakes gathered during various “Grand Tours” of Europe. The museum has always devoted galleries to the family and university history, some displaying objects from the Stanford Family Collection and others to interpretations of that history, as seen in the recent “Melancholy Museum” exhibition.
Cantor Arts Center Associate Curator of European Art Patrick Crowley decided it was time to change the entrance-level galleries (usually the first that visitors see) to examine and celebrate the crucial impact of Jane Stanford in the university’s history. The exhibition “Jane!” focuses on how she traveled the world to collect objects in the spirit of her son’s interests and to create a museum that Leland Jr. might have overseen, had he lived.
“Despite Jane’s outsize contributions to the university and especially the museum, I always felt that her story (aside from her widely publicized death) was unfairly overshadowed by her husband’s biography. It’s part of the reason I was adamant to avoid the horses and trains that tend to dominate the family history,” Crowley said.
Various portraits of Jane Stanford reveal her to be a robust figure in fine clothes and extraordinary jewels. In true Victorian style, she is seldom smiling, even in those portraits dated before the deaths of her husband and son. She gave birth to Leland Jr. at age 40 and her life’s goals were to be a perfect wife and mother.
She was thrust into the role of college founder and administrator, a position highly unusual for a woman at the time, but one that she embraced with determination and passion. As much as she may have loved her jewels, she was quite willing to sell them to support the university, as explained in the wall label for Astley Cooper’s painting, “Mrs. Stanford’s Jewel Collection.”
It was Jane’s intention that objects of art from the family home on Nob Hill in San Francisco would one day be donated to the museum. Sadly, the 1906 earthquake destroyed the home and its contents, although remnants of some personal belongings, such as a cold cream jar and several vases, were salvaged and are shown here. It is interesting to contrast Jane’s opulent ostrich feather fans with her humble handkerchief and prayer book. A tiny portrait of her in watercolor on ivory is poignant in its simplicity.
Because of their fragile nature, Jane’s Worth gowns — Worth was the designer of choice for many Gilded Age matrons — have not been displayed for many years. Crowley was able to bring the very gown she wears in the Leon Bonnat portrait out of storage, thanks to a discovery he made in the bowels of the museum.
“The biggest challenge (apart from light exposure, which we mitigate with a light cover) was that we did not have a tall case that would accommodate the dress to be shown with adequate space to rest comfortably. One day I noticed in our “graveyard” of cases that we had a very long one that seemed to be a good candidate. I asked whether we could display the dress like Snow White in her coffin, and the rest is history,” he said.
The allusion to a coffin is apt, considering that Jane’s death mask (a very Victorian custom) is placed with the dress.
In another case, Leland Jr.’s death mask is placed next to California Funk artist David Gilhooly’s “Little Leland’s Last Breakfast,” a ceramic recreation of a typical eggs-and-toast first meal of the day. The pairing is a bit jarring; the somber memorial with the tongue-in-cheek culinary tableau.
Crowley explained, “In a way, I feel this display has its roots in the Egyptian funerary practices that so fascinated Leland Jr. — food left in the tomb to sustain the life force of the deceased in the afterlife. At the same time, I wanted to lean into the frisson of such juxtapositions, using camp as a form of institutional critique that opens up new avenues of inquiry, rather than shutting them down.”
Jane Stanford was a complicated woman with often contradictory characteristics. She supported women’s suffrage, to a degree, but the movement for women’s rights conflicted with her deeply ingrained attitudes about a woman’s role in the domestic sphere. While women were admitted to Stanford University, she restricted their numbers and instructed the university board of directors that co-education would cease if women students posed a “distraction” to the men.
By 1905, Jane had overseen the building of the university and had taken 12 trips to Europe and Asia in order to collect art and antiquities for the museum. Several display cases in the exhibition reveal the range of her collecting, from the ancient — an alabaster canopic jar dating from 1550 BCE — to the 19th century, with pieces such as an ink drawing by Japanese master printer Hokusai entitled “Woodcutter Gazing at a Waterfall.”
Her efforts resulted in a universal survey museum, intended to supplement the studies of Stanford students, that could compete with the most prestigious universities in the country at that time. For years, she held complete financial control of the university and involved herself in every aspect of its administration. Needless to say, she attracted enemies along the way, including Stanford president David Starr Jordan, who she was supposedly planning to replace.
Needing a respite from the strain, she sailed to Hawaii where, according to a report in The Call newspaper from March 2, 1905, she died from strychnine poisoning. The newspaper’s front page is reproduced and displayed in the exhibition.
Official reports at the time claimed she died due to heart failure. Curiously, the mystery of the entire incident has been left to history, until recently. Crowley cited two books devoted to the subject that offer proof that she was poisoned, although who did the deed remains unknown.
“Jane’s poisoning is quite definitive!” said Crowley, “Emeritus Professor Richard White discusses this extensively in his book ‘Who Killed Jane Stanford?’ which in turn builds on Emeritus Professor Robert W.P. Cutler, who did extensive research (presented in his book ‘The Mysterious Death of Jane Stanford’) on the original medical reports and refuted the claim that Jane had died of natural causes or heart disease.”
The full title of this exhibition is “Jane! Anything But Plain” and it is most fitting. Jane Stanford was a pioneer in every sense of the word. She was a Victorian matriarch who wanted nothing more than to be a wife and mother but she became one of the most wealthy and powerful women of her time. It could be argued that her story could only have taken place in California, a land of possibilities for all.
“There seems to me something distinctly Californian about the way Jane moved through her world,” said Crowley, “her stubborn pragmatism, her staunch individualism, that grounds her life and accomplishments in such a strong sense of place.”
“Jane! Anything But Plain” will be on view at the Cantor Arts Center at Stanford University through May 2028. Admission is free. museum.stanford.edu/exhibitions/jane.
