Australian born explorers

Readers note: This is an excerpt from theTrailblazers: Australia’s 50 Greatest Explorersexhibition, developed in 2015. This content was written as a brief biography on why this person was included in the exhibition.

Born into a long line of politicians on 13 February 1743 in Westminster, England, Banks was more interested in plants than politics.

He studied botany at Oxford, but when his father died leaving him a substantial inheritance, he left to pursue his passion.

In 1766 he sailed to Newfoundland and Labrador and returned with enough specimens of rocks, plants and animals to create one of Europe’s most renowned collections.

Importantly, the expedition taught him the best way to safely store specimens on board ships in rough seas.

In 1768, Banks joined James Cook’s South Sea expedition to observe the transit of Venus. It was the Age of Enlightenment, when science ruled, so he brought along eight naturalists, collectors and artists.

They collected in Rio de Janeiro, Ti