[4] It is 10 km (6.2 mi) north of Athlone, on the N55 national secondary road, not far from the shores of Lough Ree.

The village school was built for Isabella Harris who believed that education was one of the elements which could prevent the repetition of the distress experienced during the famine of the 1840s.

Services and businesses in the village include two pubs, both with restaurants, a restaurant in the Old Garda Barracks (Called Glasson Village Restaurant), a hairdresser, Garda Station, automotive sales and repair garages, a heritage/community centre (in the old school house), service station and supermarket, a number of B&Bs, a concrete works, a stonemason's workshop, a defunct petty sessions court house, a former Royal Irish Constabulary Barracks, a dispensary operated by the Health Board, and a reproduction water pump installed by the Tidy Towns (ignoring the locations of several original pumps in the village which had been stolen).

[citation needed] The village of Glasson was built to service Waterston House, home of the Temple-Harris family.

What is lost is the rest of the house, the decorative terraced gardens, the castle on an island on the lake, the canals, woods, and shipyards.