Childhood and Education
Stephenson grew up in Burwell, a village on the edge of the Fens in Cambridgeshire, between Newmarket and Cambridge. Her father Robert (1847–1929) was a farmer, surveyor and owner of a cement-manufacturing company; her mother was Sarah Rogers (1848–1925). Robert Stephenson was a prominent figure in the local community, appointed as a Justice of the Peace and then Deputy Lieutenant of Cambridgeshire; he was also a chairman of the County Council. He employed many local people in his cement works. Both Stephenson's grandfathers, Robert Matthew Stephenson (1815–1870) and Samuel Rogers, were racehorse trainers in Newmarket, a major horse-racing centre. Samuel Rogers had been a jockey before becoming a trainer.
Stephenson was the youngest of the family by nine years. She was first inspired to take an interest in science by her governess Anna Jane Botwright, the daughter of a carpenter from Bungay. (The governess later married a solicitor and named one of her daughters Marjory). Stephenson later studied at the Berkhamsted School for Girls in Hertfordshire.
In 1903 she went to Newnham College, Cambridge. Alice Mary Stephenson, one of her sisters, had studied history at Newnham College (she became headteacher of Francis Holland School in London), and a brother, Robert, graduated from Pembroke College, Cambridge. Stephenson read Natural Sciences, taking courses in chemistry, physiology and zoology. At this time women were still excluded from Cambridge University's chemistry and zoology laboratories; Newnham College had its own chemistry laboratory and women attended biology practicals in the Balfour Laboratory.
Read more about this topic: Marjory Stephenson
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