The story of the building of McCaig's Tower is a fascinating one in its own right, but over the years elements of it have grown in the telling. The starting point has to be with John Stuart McCaig, a native of the Isle of Lismore who became a successful banker with the North of Scotland Bank. McCaig was 72 years old when in 1895 he commissioned work on what became McCaig's Tower. His view of himself can be seen from the inscription he had placed above the entrance: "Erected in 1900 by John Stuart McCaig, art critic and philosophical essayist and banker, Oban."

One of the aims of the project was a philanthropic one, of providing work for idle masons during the winter. As a result, work mainly proceeded during the winter months and it took until McCaig's death in 1902 at the age of 78 for the tower to proceed as far as the completion of the structure you see today. By this time it had cost him some £5,000, rather more than £500,000 at today's prices. McCaig's bequest of £1,000 a year thereafter to allow the completion of the tower was successfully challenged in court by his relatives and what we are left with is therefore what had been built when he died.

McCaig's Tower is made of stone extracted from the quarries at Bonawe, on Loch Etive. It has a circumference of some 200 metres, and the wall height varies around the circumference to accommodate the contours of the hilltop on which it stands.

The wall is pierced by two rings of lancet arched openings, one above the other, by a gateway on the south-east side, and by a much smaller doorway on the west side that gives access to a concrete viewing platform offering magnificent views over Oban, Kerrera, Mull and the Firth of Lorn.
(from UNDISCOVERED SCOTLAND)