Lakewood Township is the most populous municipality in Ocean County, New Jersey, situated in the northern Ocean County region of the Jersey Shore, roughly between New York City and Philadelphia. Its population has grown from about 96,000 in 2010 to roughly 140,000, making it one of New Jersey's fastest-growing municipalities, with a median age among the lowest in the state. That demographic profile reflects Lakewood's large Orthodox Jewish community, one of the largest in the country, centered on institutions of Jewish learning and family life. The township's most prominent institution is Beth Medrash Govoha, also known as the Lakewood Yeshiva, founded in 1943 by Rabbi Aharon Kotler as the first kollel in the United States. It has grown into one of the world's largest yeshivas, with thousands of students, and it anchors a broad network of schools, synagogues, and community organizations. Georgian Court University, on the former Gilded Age estate of financier George Jay Gould, adds a historic campus with Italianate gardens and a museum, preserving Lakewood's earlier identity as a late-nineteenth-century resort for wealthy New Yorkers. Recreation and everyday life center on family, community, and the Jersey Shore setting. The Jersey Shore BlueClaws, a Philadelphia Phillies minor-league affiliate, play summer baseball at FirstEnergy Park, and the township's location puts the beaches of Point Pleasant, Seaside Heights, and other Shore towns within a short drive. Rapid growth has brought substantial new housing, retail, and private school construction, with development also spreading into neighboring Jackson and Toms River. Lakewood appeals primarily to families drawn by its religious institutions and community life, as well as to households seeking a growing, well-located Ocean County township with access to the Shore and to the New York and Philadelphia metro regions.