At the Class of 1945 Library: Captains Cook, Bligh and Vancouver

Through December 14, the Class of 1945 Library is presenting the exhibition Expanding the Known World: Explorations of Cook, Bligh and Vancouver, featuring 18th-century books, maps and illustrations drawn from marine and exploration materials held in the library’s Special Collections.

Many of these voyages were undertaken with objectives quite different from those of earlier explorers who sought territory, treasure and converts.Voyages reported in these accounts sought data to add to the knowledge of European scientists and natural historians or to find, describe and study new and exotic plants—and often to import them. These captains wrote to inform their sponsors and a larger public in Europe and its outposts in North America about uncharted seas, unfamiliar peoples and unusual plants and animals. The accounts allowed readers to share the great adventure of learning new information about the planet and life on it.

The exhibit focuses on the explorations of Captain James Cook, Captain William Bligh and Captain GeorgeVancouver. One object of James Cook’s first Pacific voyage in 1769, for instance, was astronomical observation to aid the effort to measure the distance of the earth from the sun; another was collection of botanical specimens of which thousands were carefully returned to England for study.