Broadstairs

Seaside resort in east Kent, England, 5 km/3 mi southeast of Margate; population (2001) 22,700. There has been a beacon or lighthouse on North Foreland, situated off the coast of Broadstairs, since 1499. The North Foreland lighthouse (1691) is the oldest working lighthouse in England. The town is closely associated with the novelist Charles Dickens, who wrote David Copperfield (1850) here.

Broadstairs comprises the town's, and St Peter's Village, town council. Located a mile inland, St Peter's was the original settlement for which Broadstairs was a fishing outlet to the sea. As the fishing hamlet of Broadstairs grew, it eventually incorporated the farming community of St Peter's in the 19th century. The tunnels and caves, which link St Peter's to the sea at Broadstairs are evidence of smuggling activities that were rife from the 17th century onwards.

Bleak House (1790), where Dickens spent time in the 1850s and 1860s stands on the cliff above the harbour. It was named after his novel of the same name, and is now the Dickens and Maritime Museum. The town is the site of an annual Dickens's festival.

The composer Richard Rodney Bennett was born here in 1936.