Castletown, The Old Reading Room
Hall (19th Century), Reading Room (19th Century)
Site Name Castletown, The Old Reading Room
Classification Hall (19th Century), Reading Room (19th Century)
Alternative Name(s) Castletown, Public Hall And Reading Room; Traill Hall; Town Hall
Canmore ID 183380
Site Number ND16NE 79
NGR ND 19581 67751
Datum OSGB36 - NGR
Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/site/183380
- Council Highland
- Parish Olrig
- Former Region Highland
- Former District Caithness
- Former County Caithness
Single storey gabled reading room and cottage, 5-bay, grouped 3-2, lower bays of cottage to right. Squared, snecked and stugged stone with ashlar dressings, chamfered arrises. READING ROOM: 3 bays to left with pedimented and pilastered door to centre, with fanlight (blocked), with 'AMT' carved in flowing script above. flanked by broad gabled panel to left with 5-light bowed window, ashlar aproned with stone mullions and half-conical roof, quatrefoil in gablehead; flanked to left by narrower gabled panel with pedimented window, oval panel in gablehead carved with shield and motto. Graded grey slate roof. Stone finials to gableheads. Ashlar coping to steep gablehead skews and ashlar stacks.
The reading room was gifted to the town in the will of Miss Margaret Traill, and opened on New Year's day 1867. Caldwell described it as 'a boon and ornament to the locality'. (Historic Environment Scotland List Entry)
