History

In 1891 Jane and Leland Stanford established Leland Stanford Jr. University in memory of their only child, Leland Jr. After Leland Jr. died of typhoid fever in 1884 at the age of 15, the Stanfords decided they would use their wealth to do something for other people’s children by building a great university. A few years later, in 1894, the Leland Stanford Jr. Museum opened its doors.

By the turn of the 20th century, the Stanford museum was the largest privately-owned museum building in the world. Its archeological and ethnological holdings were a rarity on the West Coast, and by 1905 its collection of Asian materials was unsurpassed in the western United States. The museum served as a monument and memorial to Leland Jr., who had been an avid collector himself, and to his mother, Jane, who was dedicated to the educational potential of a great museum.

In the early 1950s, community interest prompted the university to recommend permanently reopening the museum. Finally, in 1954, the museum reopened, but its true revival occurred some years later under the leadership of Professor Lorenz Eitner, who became chair of the Department of Art & Architecture in 1963.

During the next 25 years, with the assistance of faculty, staff, and the Committee for Art at Stanford University, the galleries were refurbished, the collections strengthened, and a robust program of exhibitions, educational services, and publications put in place. The re-opening of the museum was part of the university's revitalization of the humanities under Stanford Dean Robert R. Sears.

Thomas K. Seligman, who had served for two decades as the John and Jill Freidenrich Director of the Cantor, stepped down in 2011. From 2012 to 2016, Connie Wolf, former director and C.E.O. of San Francisco's Contemporary Jewish Museum, served as the Cantor’s director.

Susan Dackerman took the helm as the Cantor’s John and Jill Freidenrich Director in September of 2017, having served previously as the Carl A. Weyerhaeuser Curator at the Harvard Art Museums from 2005 to 2015 and as a Getty scholar and consortium professor at the Getty Research Institute in Los Angeles from 2015 to 2017.