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The Flint Cottage on the Corner of Park Avenue

by Jennie Burgess

The photograph of this house shows a building right on the roadside of the corner of Park Avenue and Canterbury Road.  The house was demolished in 1933, when the latter road was widened. The property began life as a single storey flint structure. The suggested build date for it is 17^th century, but it was altered in the 18^th century, when an upper storey was added. The gables on this are external, with only an initial stepping on the lower comers, unlike the more elaborate 'Dutch' gabling on numerous properties in and around the Square. It is difficult to see from the photograph what the brick bonding is, but it would appear to be more random than Flemish-bonding, which suggests that this part is earlier in the 1700's rather than later.

The long north wall of the house has only a single small window at one end of the upper floor. (The rear wall of Vine Cottage is very similar to this.) The end gabled wall has no openings at all, the entrance being round on the south side of the house. For all its humble appearance in its earliest days, it eventually became a property of some size.  Because of this, by 1905, it had been split into two residences. The terrace of cottages that butt up close to the house on the south side, and known as South End Cottages, were erected soon after 1895, and are shown on the 1896 map.  Because these stood a little way back from the road, they escaped demolition in 1933 road-widening.

This comer site stands at a cross roads where the lane from Quex Park to Upper and Lower Gore End meets the road from St John's (Margate) to Canterbury. The fact that the house is built right up against the road, with not even room for a footpath, let alone a garden in front on either edge, suggests it was an old site, possibly used from much earlier times than the present property. The fact that all the lower, older section of the house was built of flint, suggests it must have been built at a time when there was a plentiful supply of flint in the vicinity.