Margate

Margate is a seaside town in the district of Thanet in East Kent, England. It lies 38.1 mi east-northeast of Maidstone, on the coast along the North Foreland, and contains the areas of Cliftonville, Garlinge, Palm Bay and Westbrook.

History
Margate was recorded as "Meregate" in 1264 and as "Margate" in 1299, but the spelling continued to vary into modern times. The name is thought to refer to a pool gate or gap in a cliff where pools of water are found, often allowing swimmers to jump in. The cliffs of the Isle of Thanet are composed of chalk, a fossil-bearing rock.

The town's history is tied closely to the sea and it has a proud maritime tradition. Margate was a "limb" of Dover in the ancient confederation of the Cinque ports. It was added to the confederation in the 15th century. Margate has been a leading seaside resort for at least 250 years. Like its neighbour Ramsgate, it has been a traditional holiday destination for Londoners drawn to its sandy beaches. Margate had a Victorian pier which was largely destroyed by a storm in 1978.

Like Brighton and Southend, Margate was infamous for gang violence between mods and rockers in the 1960s, and mods and skinheads in the 1980s.

The Thanet Offshore Wind Project, completed in 2010, is visible from the seafront.

Government
Since 1983, the Member of Parliament for North Thanet, covering northern Thanet and Herne Bay, has been the Conservative, Roger Gale. At the 2010 General Election, in North Thanet the Conservatives won a majority of 13,528 and 52.7% of the vote. Labour won 21.5% of the vote, Liberal Democrats 19.4% and United Kingdom Independence Party 6.5%.

Margate was incorporated as a municipal borough in 1857. This was abolished in 1974, since which date Margate has been part of the Thanet district of Kent. The town contains the seven electoral wards of Margate Central, Cliftonville West, Cliftonville East, Westbrook, Garlinge, Dane Valley and Salmestone. These wards have seventeen of the fifty six seats on the Thanet District Council. As of the 2007 Local Elections, nine of those seats were held by the Conservatives, seven by Labour and one by an Independent.

Climate
Margate experiences an oceanic climate (Köppen climate classification Cfb) similar to almost all of the United Kingdom, though its annual precipitation is lower than the national average.

Demography
As of the 2001 UK census, Margate had a population of 40,386.

The ethnicity of the town was 97.1% white, 1.0% mixed race, 0.5% black, 0.8% Asian, 0.6% Chinese or other ethnicity.

The place of birth of residents was 94.2% United Kingdom, 0.9% Republic of Ireland, 0.5% Germany, 0.8% other Western Europe countries, 0.7% Africa, 0.6% Eastern Europe, 0.5% Far East, 0.5% South Asia, 0.5% Middle East, 0.4% North America and 0.3% Oceania.

Religion was recorded as 71.6% Christian, 0.7% Muslim, 0.2% Hindu, 0.3% Buddhist, 0.1% Sikh and 0.3% Jewish. 17.1% were recorded as having no religion, 0.3% had an alternative religion and 9.8% didn't state their religion.

For every 100 females, there were 92 males. The age distribution was 6% aged 0–4 years, 16% aged 5–15 years, 5% aged 16–19 years, 31% aged 20–44 years, 23% aged 45–64 years and 19% aged 65 years and over.

11% of Margate residents had some kind of higher or professional qualification, compared to the national average of 20%.

Junior and infant

 * Palm Bay Primary School
 * Drapers Mills Primary School
 * Garlinge Primary School
 * Cliftonville Primary School
 * Holy Trinity and St John's C of E Primary School
 * Salmestone Primary School
 * St Gregory's Catholic Primary School
 * Northdown Primary

Secondary modern

 * Hartsdown Technology College
 * King Ethelbert's School (Birchington)
 * Ursuline College (Westgate-On-Sea)
 * Marlowe Academy (Broadstairs)

Special

 * Farrow House School
 * Foreland School
 * Laleham Gap School
 * St Anthony's School
 * Royal School for Deaf Children and Westgate College.

Grammar

 * Chatham House Grammar School - Combined into one school in 2011  (Ramsgate)
 * Clarenden House Grammar School - Combined into one school in 2011  (Ramsgate)
 * Dane Court Grammar School (Broadstairs)

Economy
As of the 2001 UK census, the economic activity of residents aged 16–74 was 33.8% in full-time employment, 11.8% in part-time employment, 8.0% self-employed, 5.5% unemployed, 2.2% students with jobs, 3.9% students without jobs, 15.5% retired, 8.3% looking after home or family, 7.9% permanently sick or disabled and 3.6% economically inactive for other reasons. The rate of unemployment in the town was considerably higher than the national rate of 3.4%.

The industry of employment of residents was 17% retail, 16% health & social work, 13% manufacturing, 9% construction, 8% real estate, 8% education, 7% transport & communications, 5% public administration, 6% hotels & restaurants, 2% finance, 1% agriculture and 6% other community, social or personal services. Compared to national figures, the town had a relatively high number of workers in the construction, hotels & restaurants and health & social care industries and a relatively low number in real estate and finance.

In more recent years, as tourists have travelled further afield, Margate's unemployment rate has become higher than much of the rest of south eastern England.

Margate railway station, constructed in 1926 to designs by Edwin Maxwell Fry, serves the town. Train services are provided by Southeastern Trains.

Tourism
For at least 250 years, the town has been a leading seaside resort in the UK, drawing Londoners to its beaches, Margate Sands. The bathing machines in use at Margate were described in 1805 as four-wheeled carriages, covered with canvas, and having at one end of them an umbrella of the same materials which is let down to the surface of the water, so that the bather descending from the machine by a few steps is concealed from the public view, whereby the most refined female is enabled to enjoy the advantages of the sea with the strictest delicacy.

Margate faces major structural redevelopments and large inward investment. Its Dreamland Amusement Park (featured in "The Jolly Boys' Outing" extended episode of the television series Only Fools and Horses) was threatened with closure because of the increase in value of the site. In 2003, one of the arcades on the seafront was destroyed by fire. This has created a new potential entrance point to the Dreamland site. In the following years, 2004–2006 it was announced that Dreamland (although somewhat reduced in its amusements) would reopen for three months of the summer; a pressure group has been formed to keep it in being. The group is anxious to restore the UK's oldest wooden roller coaster,

The Scenic Railway, which is Grade II Listed and the second oldest in the world, was severely damaged in a fire on 7 April 2008. It was planned that the Dreamland site would reopen as a heritage amusement park in the near future with the Scenic Railway at the centre. Classic rides from the defunct Southport amusement park have already been shipped in as well as parts of the now-demolished water chute at Rhyl. More details on Dreamland's future can be obtained from the Dreamland Trust website. Today the Dreamland roller coaster is one of only two early-20th century scenic railways still remaining in the UK; the only other surviving UK scenic railway is located in Great Yarmouth and was built in 1932. If the Dreamland Scenic Railway is not rescued, the Great Yarmouth coaster will become the last of its kind in the country. The Margate roller coaster is an ACE Coaster Classic.

Cliftonville, next to Margate, has a classic British Arnold Palmer seaside mini golf course.

The Turner Contemporary art gallery occupies a prominent position next to the harbour.

There are two notable theatres, the Theatre Royal in Addington Street - the second oldest theatre in the country - and the Tom Thumb Theatre, the second smallest in the country, in addition to the Winter Gardens. The Theatre Royal was built in 1787, burned down in 1829 and was remodelled in 1879 giving Margate more national publicity. The exterior is largely from the l9th century. From 1885 to 1899 actor-manager Sarah Thorne ran a school for acting at the Theatre Royal which is widely regarded as Britain's first formal drama school. Actors who received their initial theatrical training there include Harley Granville-Barker, Evelyn Millard, Louis Calvert, George Thorne, Janet Achurch, Adelaide Neilson and Irene and Violet Vanbrugh, among others.

An annual jazz festival takes place on a weekend in July. Margate Museum in Market Place explores the town's seaside heritage in a range of exhibits and displays, and is now opened at weekends by a team of volunteers.

First discovered in 1798, the Margate Caves (also known as the Vortigern Caves) are situated at the bottom of Northdown Road. They are currently closed to the public.

The Shell Grotto, which has walls and roof covered in elaborate decorations of over four million shells covering 2000 sqft in complex patterns, was rediscovered in 1835, but is of unknown age and origin. It has been designated as a Grade I listed building.

There is a 16th century 2-storey timber-framed Tudor house built on a flint plinth in King Street.

Regeneration
The former chairman of the Margate Civic Society, John Crofts, had a plan to develop a centre that would explore and show the link that the painter JMW Turner shared with Margate. In 1994 he became increasingly determined to create such a gallery and in 1998 the Leader of Kent County Council met a number of people from the art world to discuss the idea. They hoped that the centre would regenerate the once-thriving town of Margate and offer an alternative to Margate's traditional tourist trade. In the late 1990s, the County Council offered to fund the building of the Turner Gallery. Additional funding was contributed by the Arts Council England and South East England Development Agency. In 2001 the Turner Contemporary was officially established. The site initially proposed formed part of the harbour itself, but some critics questioned the prudence of placing part of Britain's national art treasures in a spot that was exposed to the full fury of the North Sea. To reduce the cost, Thanet District Council chose a new site inland from the harbour wall. The scheme was supported by the artist Tracey Emin, who was brought up in Margate. The building itself was designed by David Chipperfield Architects after the abandonment of the design by Snøhetta + Spence architects. Building work started in 2008 but the project's initiator, John Crofts, died in 2009. The Turner Contemporary Gallery officially opened on 16 April 2011. It is hoped the gallery will help regenerate the town in the same way St Ives has benefited from the introduction of the Tate Gallery.

Across the road from the gallery in Margate Old Town there is a thriving community of independent shops. Accessed from the seafront via Market Street, Duke Street and King Street this fascinating area is clustered around the Old Town Hall and Market Place. There is also a small museum in the Market Place where one can learn a little about the history of Margate. In the Old Town local entrepreneurs are aiding regeneration by giving visitors an ever-expanding range of shops in which to browse and buy... and an equal variety of places in which to eat and drink. In 2012 Margate was chosen as one of the towns to benefit from the Portas Pilot Scheme aimed at regenerating some of Britain's run-down High Streets. It is hoped that the money provided by the scheme will enable the re-opening of the many empty shop units in the lower High Street.

Cultural references
Victorian author William Thackeray used out-of-season Margate as the setting for his early unfinished novel 'A Shabby Genteel Story'.

Margate features as a destination in Graham Swift's novel Last Orders and the film version of it. Jack Dodds has asked to have his remains scattered at Margate. The book tells the tale of the drive to Margate and the memories evoked on the way. It also features at the start and as a recurrent theme in Iain Aitch's travelogue A Fete Worse Than Death. The author was born in the town.

T. S. Eliot, who recuperated after a mental breakdown in the suburb of Cliftonville in 1921, commented in his poem The Waste Land Part III - The Fire Sermon:
 * On Margate sands.
 * I can connect
 * Nothing with nothing.

Draper's Mill is a smock mill built in 1845 by John Holman. It was working by wind until 1916 and by engine until the late 1930s. It was saved from demolition and is now restored and open to the public.

The town appeared on BBC TV's The Apprentice in May 2009.

The town was the title of a minor UK hit by Chas & Dave in 1982.

Margate, most notably the railway station and Dreamland, featured prominently in the 1989 Only Fools & Horses episode 'The Jolly Boys' Outing'.

'Margate Fhtagn' is a song by UK steampunk band The Men That Will Not Be Blamed For Nothing. The story of the song combines the Victorian tradition of the seaside holiday with the works of H. P. Lovecraft, specifically the Cthulhu Mythos. It tells the story of a Victorian family going on a seaside holiday to Margate, which gets interrupted by Cthulhu rising from the sea.

Sport

 * Margate Boxing Club.
 * Margate Yacht Club.
 * Margate F.C. play at Hartsdown Park. The club has played in the Conference National, but they are currently aiming to gain promotion out of the Isthmian League Premier Division.
 * National beach volleyball competitions are often held on the main sands.
 * The Margate Big Sky Beach Race, run on the beach at Margate, had its 5th event on 6 and 7 March 2010 and attracts a number of the UK's top quad riders and racers as well as some from overseas. Spectating is free and usually attracts thousands of visitors over the weekend. The event is run by the QRA UK.

Local media
Margate has two paid-for newspapers, the Isle of Thanet Gazette and Thanet Times (which is now delivered free to some areas), which are owned by Northcliffe Media. Free newspapers for the town include the Thanet Extra, part of the KM Group; and yourthanet, part of KOS Media. Local radio stations are KMFM Thanet, owned by the KM Group, community radio station Academy FM (Thanet); and the county-wide stations Heart Kent, Gold and BBC Radio Kent.Thanet Community Radio also offer a online community podcasting service for Ramsgate, Broadstairs, Margate and the wider areas of Thanet.

Twin towns / Sister cities
Margate is twinned with the following towns / cities:
 * 🇨🇾 Larnaca, Cyprus
 * 🇩🇪 Idar-Oberstein, Germany
 * 🇰🇿 Astana, Kazakhstan
 * 🇺🇦 Yalta, Ukraine