Westgate-on-Sea

Westgate-on-Sea is a seaside town in northeast Kent, England, with a population of 6,996 at the 2011 Census. It is within the Thanet local government district and borders the larger seaside resort of Margate. Its two sandy beaches have remained a popular tourist attraction since the town's development in the 1860s from a small farming community.

The town is notable for once being the location of a Royal Naval Air Service seaplane base at St Mildred's Bay, which defended the Thames Estuary coastal towns during World War I. The town is the subject of Sir John Betjeman's poem, Westgate-on-Sea. Residents have included the 19th-century surgeon Sir Erasmus Wilson and former Archbishop of Canterbury William Temple. The artist Sir William Quiller Orchardson painted several of his best-known pictures while living in Westgate-on-Sea. The British composer Arnold Cooke attended the town's Streete Preparatory School in the early 20th century, and Eton headmaster Anthony Chenevix-Trench spent the earliest few years of his education in the town.

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