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Dame Rosemary and Gardening

In 2004 Dame Rosemary Murray was present at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show to see the launch of the rose named in her honour on the Harkness stand. She is pictured here with Anne Lonsdale, a former President of New Hall and Robert Harkness.

Now that the 2007 Show is over, the Gardens Team have re-created the Chelsea Garden in memory of our First President, Dame Rosemary Murray, using many of the original features from the show. Dame Rosemary was a remarkable woman who was not only President of the College, but who, in its early days, was also its handyman, gardener and boatkeeper. She had a keen interest in gardening and many of our alumnae fondly remember the enthusiasm with which she tended to New Hall's gardens during her Presidency. The Dame Rosemary Murray Garden is a fitting way to remember her contribution to the College's horticultural life.

Frine Zaballero (NH '65) wrote of Dame Rosemary's gardening hobby:

"This particular aspect of her many-faceted life became the subject of a mini controversy amongst some of the 1965 undergraduates belonging to the Junior Common Room. There were those who considered it undignified for the President of the College to be wearing wellies and kneeling on the ground, trowel in hand, to dig holes for planting bulbs. Others found nothing wrong with such an image.

At the end of the day, the pros won the argument and the antis were silenced when, in the spring of 1966, the flowers opened in blazes of colour, first of bright yellow daffodils and fragrant narcissus, followed later by brilliant red Oriental poppies as well as blue and mauve Canterbury Bells and sprays of white gypsophila."