Thomas Cook (22 November 1808 18 July 1892) of Melbourne, Derbyshire, England founded the travel agency that

t in 2007 became Thomas Cook Group.

Life[edit]
Thomas Cook was born to John and Elizabeth Cook, who lived at 9 Quick Close in the village [1] of Melbourne, Derbyshire. The couple's first child, he was named after Elizabeth's father, Thomas Perkins. Sadly, John Cook died when Thomas was three years old, and his mother remarried later that same year. At the age of 10, Cook started working as an assistant to a local market gardener for a wage of six pence a week. At the age of 14, he secured an apprenticeship with John Pegg, and spent five years [1] as a cabinet maker. He was brought up as a strict Baptist, and joined his local Temperance Society. In February 1826, Cook became a preacher, and toured the region as a village evangelist, distributing pamphlets, and [1] occasionally working as a cabinet maker to earn money. After working as a part-time publisher of Baptist and Temperance pamphlets, he became a Baptist minister in 1828. In 1832, Cook moved to Adam and Eve Street in Market Harborough. Influenced by the local Baptist minister Francis Beardsall, he took thetemperance pledge on New Year's Day in 1833. As a part of the [1] temperance movement, he organized meetings and held anti-liquor processions. On 3 March 1833, Cook married Marianne Mason. John Mason Cook, their only son, was born on 13 [1] January 1834. Thomas Cook died on 18 July 1892, having been afflicted with blindness in his declining [2] years.

The first-ever excursions[edit]

Cook's idea to offer excursions came to him while waiting for the stagecoach on the London Road at Kibworth. With the opening of the extendedMidland Counties Railway, he arranged to take a group of 540 temperance campaigners from Leicester Campbell Street station to a rally inLoughborough, eleven miles away. On 5 July 1841, Thomas Cook arranged for the rail company to charge one shilling per person that included rail tickets and food for this train journey. Cook was paid a share of the fares actually charged to the passengers, as the railway tickets, being legal contracts between company and passenger, could not have been issued at his own price. This was the first privately chartered excursion train to be advertised to the general public; Cook himself acknowledging that there had been previous, [3] unadvertised, private excursion trains. During the following three summers he planned and conducted outings for temperance societies and Sunday-school children. In 1844 the Midland Counties Railway Company agreed to make a permanent arrangement with him provided he found the passengers. This success led him to start his own business running rail excursions for pleasure, taking a percentage of the railway tickets.