Jo Ann Stabb, a founding member of the UC Davis Department of Design and a widely recognized scholar of textiles, died Feb. 13 in Walnut Creek, California. She was 80.

“Jo Ann Stabb essentially started the textile and fashion curriculum in the department,”  design professor Susan Taber Avila said in a 2017 interview. “She captured the zeitgeist of the wearable art movement and brought that creativity into her teaching. She understood and championed the value of studying actual textiles and artifacts.”

Alumni and longtime university supporters Lois and Darryl Goss are creating a presidential chair in African American and African studies at the University of California, Davis, to provide sustained funding for teaching, research and outreach about the history and culture of communities of African descent around the world.