The Castle House Museum occupies the top floor of a handsome marine villa which was built in 1822 by James Ewing, an East India merchant and the Lord Provost of Glasgow, for use as a holiday home. The building, together with its lovely grounds, was acquired in 1893 by the Dunoon Burgh Commissioners for the use of the public and it occupies an imposing position set above the town’s magnificent Victorian Pier. Since 1998 the museum has portrayed the development of Dunoon and Cowal from earliest times in a bright modern way with an interesting series of exhibitions together with four authentically refurbished Victorian Rooms. The majority of oil paintings in the collection are of Clyde steamers, donated to the Museum by Father Sydney MacEwan, a Catholic priest and world famous tenor.