Coinciding with the 250^th anniversary of his first voyage, my paper will explore the historically neglected context of James Cook’s representation in Australia during the 1920s and 1930s. The historiography, national commemoration and construction of the grand narrative that surrounds Cook has largely occurred in an ad hoc manner. Most historical accounts focus on Federation in 1901 as a marker of when Cook was firmly embedded in Australia’s national consciousness as a ‘founding father’. Yet an examination of the interwar period reveals a more complex nationalisation process. Prior to the First World War, Indigenous Australians played a significant role in his commemoration. By the 1920s, however, the Indigenous presence was being substituted for a narrative that emphasised Australia’s status as a white and industrious dominion within the British Empire, evinced by military exploits at Gallipoli and on the Western Front. This shift in focus provides fresh insights into the scale of Cook’s legacy in Australia. It highlights the importance of the interwar period and the nationalist agenda that monopolised his exploits in the service of cultural, social and political concerns in the domestic and international arenas.