The abundance of camas bulbs, a favorite fodder of pigs brought by the farmers, led to naming the vicinity "Hog Heaven."

The name Paradise persists in the main waterway through town, Paradise Creek, which originates at the west end of the Palouse Range, flows south to the Troy Highway, and west to Pullman where it enters the South Fork of the Palouse River.

[8] Early settlers reported that five local men met to choose a proper name for the town, but could not agree.

[10] In March 1890, Moscow's neighboring city, Pullman, became the home of Washington's land grant institution.

Andrew Carnegie promised funding of $10,000 if the community agreed to maintain a free public library at the rate of at least $1000 annually.

It houses a children's room named for Moscow native Carol Ryrie Brink, the author of 1936 Newbery Medal winner Caddie Woodlawn.

[18] The city developed a revitalization project for downtown in the early 1970s that included a major traffic revision,[19][20] which was enacted in 1981.

[26] At the north end of Moscow, southbound highway traffic divided west at 'D' Street to Jackson and returned to Main at 8th; the northbound route divided east at 8th, but returned to Main four blocks earlier in the north end, at 1st Street.

The primary safety hazard was inexperienced truck drivers—excessive speed through the tight corners led to toppled loads and subsequent traffic snarls, with occasional damage to adjacent structures.

[33] The building on the southeast corner, the Idaho Hotel,[34] built in 1890,[18] was razed for the traffic project in 1977 and was a vacant lot for over a decade.

Agricultural buildings on the block between Jackson and Main (College St. to Lewis St.) were razed in the late 1990s to complete this new corridor.

[41] The completion of the south couplet allowed Gritman Medical Center to expand southward, over Eighth Street.

[50] A fixture of the Moscow skyline for nearly a century,[51] the concrete grain elevators on south Main Street were demolished in March 2007.

[61] Moscow is known internationally as the location of Christ Church and its associated ministries: Canon Press and New Saint Andrews College, as well as Logos School.

[62] In the early morning hours of November 13, 2022, four University of Idaho students were stabbed to death in an off-campus rented home in Moscow by one or more attackers using one or more long knives.

[66] Moscow lies on the eastern edge of the Palouse region of north central Idaho in the Columbia River Plateau.

[69] The geology in and around Moscow represents varied formations: very old intrusive granite structures of the Jurassic−Eocene Idaho Batholith, fertile fields atop rolling hills of deep Pleistocene loess of the Palouse Formation deposited after the last ice age by westerly winds, and flood-worn channels of the Columbia River Basalt Group.

An amphibian, the Rough-skinned Newt, has a disjunctive population at Moscow; this species is found typically along the Pacific coast of the US.

[72] The city sits at the boundary between the Palouse grasslands and wheat fields, and the conifer forests of the Rocky Mountains to the east.

The city was highlighted in a comedy special at University of Idaho by actor-comedian Yakov Smirnoff, filmed in late 1990.

[80][81] There are seventeen neighborhood parks located throughout the town offering a wide variety of venues for outdoor activities.

The Moscow Pathways Commission[82] (formerly Paradise Path Task Force) is a citizen committee seeking to develop a system of linearly connected parks throughout the area.

Carol Ryrie Brink Nature Park was a community collaboration between the Palouse Clearwater Environmental Institute and local volunteers to remeander Paradise Creek and add riparian plantings.

The Moscow community, including schools and the city, led by local youth, raised money over several years to fund, design, and build a skate park that was completed in 2000.

A park just north of the university is named for Admiral Robert Ghormley,[83] from 1933 to 1997, it was the site of the city's outdoor swimming pool.

Starting at the University of Idaho's Perimeter Road, it gradually descends with Paradise Creek for eight miles (13 km) to Pullman through Whitman County, alongside the Moscow-Pullman Highway.

Completed in April 1998,[91] the trail honors a Pullman businessman (and UI alumnus) who died two years earlier, following a winter highway accident in Spokane County.

[92][93] The Paradise Path bridges the gap in Moscow between the endpoints of the Chipman and Latah trails, passing through the north and east edges of the UI campus.

Formed by the territorial legislature on January 30, 1889, the university opened its doors in 1892 on October 3, with an initial class of 40 students.

[105] A small network of bike lanes and sharrows connects the Paradise Path to downtown and residential areas to the east.