50 Dollars - Elizabeth II Captain James Cook

Cook Islands issued a wave of large-format silver commemoratives throughout the late 1980s, many produced by the Pobjoy Mint under contract, targeting the collector market rather than circulation. The 1988 Cook bicentennial — marking 200 years since Cook's third voyage crew first sighted the islands that would bear his name — generated particular interest from Pacific rim dealers.

Cook himself never set foot on the islands named after him; the naming was done posthumously by Russian cartographers working from his charts.