Sir Joseph Banks, during his long and useful life, was ever a warm and active friend to geography. Born in 1743, of a good Lincolnshire family, he inherited Revesby Abbey when he came of age. While still at Eton and Christ Church his love for natural history, and especially for botany, attracted attention; and in 1766 he made a voyage to Newfoundland with his friend, Lieut. Phipps, the future Arctic explorer, to collect plants. Soon after his return he was appointed naturalist to Captain Cook's expedition, and was absent in the famous circumnavigation of the globe from 1768 to 1771. In 1772 he made a voyage to Iceland, and was elected President of the Royal Society in 1778, from which time he devoted himself to the duties of his office with the utmost zeal. He was habitually consulted by the Government, and was created a Baronet in 1781, a Knight of the Bath in 1795, and a Privy Councillor in 1797. Sir Joseph Banks was the first Englishman upon whom an order of knighthood was conferred for scientific services.

It was in 1788 that a company of ardent geographers, amongst whom was the President of the Royal Society, formed an association for promoting discovery in the interior of Africa. They saw that much of Asia, a still larger proportion of America, and almost the whole of Africa was unvisited and unknown.