24 Hour Museum - official guide to UK museums, galleries, exhibitions and heritage
Gateway to Over 3,000 UK museums, galleries and heritage attractions
Skip to navigation
Museum Details
Captain Cook Memorial Museum
Image
Captain Cook Memorial Museum
Grape Lane
Whitby
YO22 4BA
North Yorkshire
England
Collection details
Maritime
Facilities
Shop: yes
Guided tours: yes
Library: yes
Study area: yes
Wheelchair access: yes
Visual disability facilities: yes
Hearing disability facilities: yes
Guided Tours are available for organised groups, schools, students or adults. French, German and Spanish speakers are available for Groups by prior arrangement
Contact details
General information (Tel)
:
01947 601900
General information (Fax)
:
01947 601900
E-mail
:
cookmuseum@tiscali.co.uk
Website
:
www.cookmuseumwhitby.co.uk
Open
March: daily, 1100 - 1500
1 April to 31 October: daily, 0945 - 1700
Closed
November - February (except for Groups by prior arrangement)
Admission charges
Adults: £4.00
Children: £3.00
OAPs: £3.50
Family: £10.50
Description
The Museum is in the Grade-1-listed, 17c house on Whitby's harbourside which belonged to Captain John Walker. In 1746 the young Cook came here as Walker's apprentice. When not at sea he lodged with the other apprentices in the attic - still preserved. The Museum houses a rich collection, artefacts from the Voyages, original letters of the period, some in Cook's own hand, paintings - Parry's Omai, Gainsborough, Hodges.
Every year the Museum stages a special exhibition in the attic. The exhibition for 2008 is: ‘Smoking Coasts and ice-bound Seas, Cook's Voyage to the Arctic’. The North West Passage was the purpose of Cook's third Voyage. The exhibition tells the story of how his ships probed twice beyond the Bering Straits before being forced back by the pack-ice, and how, on a second attempt, they stopped at Kamchatka in eastern Siberia, where they met with Russians and native peoples, travelled for the first time on a dog sled, and experienced a volcanic eruption.
The Museum has recently acquired a group of six drawings of natives of Kamchatka by John Webber, the artist of the third Voyage. With these and other pictures drawn at the time, the Museum explores the surprising story of this little known part of Cook's voyages. The exhibition is supported by the Heritsge Lottery Fund.
For details see 'exhibitions' or the Museum's web site.
Collections description
The Museum celebrates Cook's Whitby years and his later achievements. The collection includes period rooms restored faithfully following an inventory of 1752, models, maps and manuscripts, ship plans, artefacts from the Voyages, and many fine original paintings, drawings and prints.
Key artists and exhibits
Captain Cook; original letters
;
Sir Joseph Banks ; documents
;
Gainsborough; Lord Sandwich
;
William Hodges; Madeira
;
John Russell; Captain Bligh of the Bounty and his wife
;
William Parry: Group Portrait of Omai, Joseph Banks and Dr Solander
;
Johann Forster; desk, and letters
;
John Webber; 3rd Voyage drawings
;
Exploration; Australia, New Zealand, Canada
;
The Antarctic
;
Maritime History - dockyards and plans
;
Endeavour; ship plan
;
Resolution; ship model
;
Ethnography - the Pacific
;
Whitby; 18c watercolours, John Bird
Articles
Whitby Acquires Drawings Of Kamchatkans From Cook's Last Voyage
News In Brief - Week Ending March 4 2007
News In Brief - Week Ending January 21 2007
Looking After The Rural Museums Of North Yorkshire
MGM 2003 - Boys At Sea At The Captain Cook Memorial Museum
Available resources
Guided Tour for School Parties
Resource or activity pack; Taught session (schools); Teachers' pack or notes
Teachers' Resource Pack
Resource or activity pack; Teachers' pack or notes; Worksheets or templates
Home Page
News Page
Exhibition Page
What's On
Trails Page
Website of the Week
Letters Page
Welsh Home
Graphical Version
Copyright © 24 Hour Museum
Information published here was believed to be correct at the time it was prepared. Welsh language pages developed with CYMAL: Museums Archives and Libraries Wales, funded by the Welsh Assembly Government.