Cook joined the Royal Navy relatively late in life

James Cook was the Scottish immigrant farmworker's son. When Cook was still a child, his father took over as the foreman of a farm in a nearby community. Early indications of James' curious and intelligent mind led to the village's employer paying for his tuition there until he was 12 years old. Although he spent his early adolescence on the farm where his father worked, he came into contact with ships and the sea during a brief apprenticeship in a general shop in a seaside community north of Whitby.

At the age of 17, Cook won an apprenticeship with a merchant sailing firm after having previously worked on a farm in Yorkshire. He began his career as a mariner on shipping expeditions in the stormy North and Baltic Seas, and he spent the following ten years moving up the ranks and perfecting navigation. He was being trained to become a captain, but in 1755, he surprised his mentors by leaving his job as a merchant seaman and joining the British Royal Navy as a common seaman instead.

Cook may have joined the Royal Navy at the very late age of 26, but it took him just two years to advance from able seaman to ship's master. He was able to perfect the navigation and mapping abilities that were so essential to his success as an explorer throughout his years as a merchant marine apprentice and his service during the Seven Years' War. Later in his career, he gained such a reputation that sailors from rival nations were advised to avoid him if they came across him at sea.