Carol Margot Osborne
Sept. 4, 1929-Oct. 15, 2018
Mountain View, California

Carol Osborne died on Oct. 15, 2018 under hospice care in Vacaville, California. Born in Great Neck, New York, Carol left Barnard College to marry and subsequently to move to Claremont, California, where her first husband, Howard Young, taught at Pomona College. While in Claremont, Carol worked at the Pomona College Art Gallery as a slide librarian and secretary. After her divorce from second husband Marshall Waingrow, Carol returned to school and earned a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Art History from UC Riverside. In 1979, after completing her doctorate in art history at Stanford, Carol was appointed the Associate Director and Chief Curator of the Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Center for Visual Arts (previously the Stanford Museum of Art), a position she held for 15 years until her retirement in 1993. In her lifetime, Carol wrote or contributed to many articles, catalogs and books, most notably about 18th century French book illustration, the American artists Franck Duveneck and Lizzie Boott, the Stanfords as Collectors and Patrons of Art, Salviati Venetian Glass and the 19th century American painter and naturalist William Trost Richards. Intellectually curious and bookish by nature, Carol also loved gardening, hosting dinner parties, visiting the 18th century farmhouse she owned with friends in the Charente region of France and most of all, spending time with her family, for whom she will always be Coco. Carol was predeceased by her brother, Paul Osborne. She is survived by her two daughters, Laurie Mehlhaff of Truckee, California and Jennifer Enzminger of Danville, California; six grandchildren, Christopher, Matthew, Patrick and Sara Mehlhaff; Peter Enzminger, and Molly Enzminger McCown; and three great-grandchildren, Nichole, Peter and Abigail Mehlhaff.

Tags: arts/media, business