Diane's Legacy

When you know a brave and heroic force for change and progress like Diane Lindstrom, you can hardly imagine her losing any battles, especially to cancer. Diane was a brilliant economic historian when being a woman historian was not the norm—in fact she was the first tenured historian here at UW. She taught the very first gender studies course and inspired generations of young scholars, particularly women, towards equity and inclusion.

Diane was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in 2012 and fought bravely through four recurrences, participating in clinical trials and bravely exploring new innovations in treatments until her final day in February 2018.

From the time of her diagnosis, Diane, her son, Erik Jacobsen, and his wife Christina looked for ways to give back and support research.

In an effort to better understand her cancer, Diane attended a lab tour hosted by Dr. Manish Patankar, and, ever the scientist herself, became passionate about the research being done at the UW Health | Carbone Cancer Center, asking many questions of Dr. Patankar and often interrogating her trusted doctor, Howard Bailey.

After Diane’s death, Erik and Christina felt more than ever that they had to try to move the needle on what is being done to defeat ovarian cancer.

In January 2019 they endowed The Diane Lindstrom Ovarian Cancer Research Fund to help launch new research projects and support brilliant doctors and scientists who are looking at ovarian cancer from new angles with new technologies.

Diane’s legacy lives on, giving other women diagnosed with ovarian cancer new hope and inspiring the science and research at UW, every day, forever.

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