Newsletter for the Rotary Club of Greater Geraldton - Issue No.: 777 Issue Date: 25 Mar, 2024

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Endeavor at Botony Bay

The Legacy of James Cook

Ah ha! Fooled you guys! Yes Ludwig Van Beethoven is 250 years old this year, but I couldn’t give away too much on the article summary!

Let’s get back to James Cook, now a full Captain after his first voyage.  Peter Fitzsimmons argues that James Cook was primarily an explorer and scientist, not an imperialist. Wherever possible Cook tried to initiate friendly contact with the “natives”, though not always successfully, and there was some inevitable bloodshed. But it is a sad fact that whenever imperialist powers moved into these new lands and colonized them, the indigenous people suffered through loss of land and culture and confrontations that we of the modern world looking back are not proud of. The appalling systematic genocide of Tasmanian aborigines is a chilling example.  It is, however, unreasonable in my opinion to blame James Cook for the subsequent suffering the indigenous peoples of Australia and New Zealand suffered at the hands of colonization.

After his highly successful second voyage around the world, Cook became a celebrity, was promoted to Post Captain and was considered of such high merit as a scientist that he was admitted as a member to the Royal Society and awarded the Copley Gold Medal “for outstanding achievements in research”. Cook sailed off on his third voyage in 1776 attempting to discover the “Northwest Passage” from the Pacific to the Atlantic above Canada. He failed in this and sailed back into the South Seas, only to be killed in Hawaii in February 1779. The man who mapped the world was dead.

Endeavor repilica, was built in Fremantle.

Cook in Botony Bay with Banks, a very unrealistic painting!!

At this time the American War of Independence was underway, and American Ships were ordered to sink or capture British ships on sight. With one exception. On March 10 1779, the US Ambassador to France, His Excellency Benjamin Franklin writes a passport to be sent to all sea captains. As a measure of the respect held for Cook as a scientist by the world his ship was not to be considered an enemy and not to be obstructed in any way, affording all assistance as “common friends to mankind”. 

There is no doubt in my mind Captain James Cook was the greatest explorer and scientist of his age. We should celebrate his contribution to furthering the knowledge and understanding of our world.

Post Script:

While we were undertaking our Zoom meeting last Wednesday May 6, that was the 250th anniversary of Cook’s greatest “non discovery”. Having weighed anchor and departed “Botany Bay”, Cook sailed past what looked like an entrance to what appeared to be a safe anchorage, “Which I called Port Jackson”. The opening Cook sailed past was actually a rather grand harbour, that one day would be named Sydney Harbour….

 

Author: Ian Taylor

Published: 10 May, 2020

 


Meeting Rosters
Date
Setup & Door
Setup & Door
Guest Speaker Host
Invocation & Toast
Raffle & Rotary Cor
Guest Speaker Thanks
Fines Master
Chairman
27 Mar, 24
Barry Dring
 
Grant Woodhams
Robert Mosel
Phil Martin
Terry Stewart
Karen Godfrey
Geoff Wood
10 Apr, 24
Laurie Dines
 
Ian Taylor
Karen Godfrey
Hugh Lavery
Jason McCarthy
Robert Symington
Geoff Wood
© Copyright 2006 R. L. Dender All Rights Reserved