The name honours a gift of £30 million by alumna Ros Edwards and her husband Steve, and the first President and woman Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, Rosemary Murray.

Cambridge then had the lowest proportion of women undergraduates of any university in the United Kingdom and only two other colleges (Girton and Newnham) admitted female students.

In 1967, one of the college's PhD students, Jocelyn Bell Burnell, a researcher in the university radio astronomy group, discovered the first four pulsars, leading to a Nobel Prize for her supervisor, and, ultimately, for Bell Burnell herself, a position as a research professor at the University of Oxford.

[10] Ros Edwards had attended the college in the 1980s and made a fortune with her partner when their software company Geneva Technology was sold to Convergys in 2001.

The Arms of the college are emblazoned as follows: In plain English, this means: on a black background, place the following features in silver.

The three stars are borrowed from the Murray coat of arms, while the heraldic dolphin symbolises a youthful spirit of exploration and discovery, and a kindly intelligence.

[23] This includes: The college gardens have an informal style, initially planned and planted by the first president, Dame Rosemary Murray.

The gardens include a greenhouse originally belonging to the estate of the Darwin family, where banana plants are grown during the winter months.

As part of the Cambridge tradition of May Week, the college hosts an annual garden party that is popular with students from across the university.

[29] Donations have continued since, and the Art Collection now contains work by many famous women artists, including:[30] 52°12′51″N 0°06′31″E / 52.2142°N 0.1086°E / 52.2142; 0.1086 (Murray Edwards College)