John Davis

John Davis Born about 1550, died 1605. John Davis was a great explorer, had great skill in navigation with patience and careful work. He invented the Davis quadrant Davis invented the backstaff in 1595.  he went farther north than any explorer had gone before and mapped huge areas. This made it possible for later explores to go further. He lead several voyagers to discover the northwest passages and served as a pilot and caption on both Dutch and English vogues to the indies. David's life as a sailor and explore was dedicated to the service oh hid country and the science navigation in the best tradition Elizabethan seamanship. Davis seems to have commended the black dog against the Spanish armada and sailed with Thomas Cavendish on his last voyage in 1519, He also sailed with sir Walter Raleigh to Cádiz and to the azores. Davis had technical four voyages  First voyage Sunshine and moonshine. Second voyage sunshine moonshine, mermayde, and north starre. Third voyage Ellen, sunshine, and Elizabeth, His last ship was tiger. Davis had three ships named Ellen, sunshine and Elizabeth. two for fishing and one for exploring. He died on December 29, 1605 in a battle with Japanese pirates.




The connection with John Davis that we discussed in class are that he sailed three times to try and find the northwest passage. Although he failed to try and find it he went further north then any explorer had gone before and mapped huge areas. He also invented the Davis Quadrant, a tool used for measuring the position of the ship on the earth. We discussed that Davis invented the backstaff in 1995, a navigational tool to measure latitude, They would turn their backs to the sun and measure its shadows instead of having to look straight into the sun. Davis failed a lot trying to explore but it never stopped him, he failed 3 times trying to explore the Northwest Passage. What makes him a good explorer is that he is patient with his navigation and careful with his work. On his third voyage, Davis had three ships Ellen, sunshine and Elizabeth, His two ships sunshine and Elizabeth were only for fishing. He explored both sides of the Davis strait in Ellen and went as far north as 73 degrees north. First voyage Sunshine and moonshine. Second voyage sunshine moonshine, mermayde, and north starre. Third voyage Ellen, sunshine, and Elizabeth, His last ship was tiger.


This reminds me of  finding nemo, nemo and John Davis have similar things, in the movie finding nemo is all about adventure and exploring, nemo gets lost a lot as such Davis fails to explore places. Finding nemo is a good choice for this because I feel it relates to john Davis. finding nemo is all about trying find him and they explore the whole sea looking for that one thing which is nemo, they fail sometimes but in the end they end up finding him. John Davis explores the sea trying to find the northwest passage. He fails such as in finding nemo they fail a lot trying to find nemo.