The castle was the main base of the Macleans of Kingairloch (Kingerloch) since the 15th century, but the population fell from 500 to zero after 1812 when they emigrated to Pictou, Nova Scotia.

To minimise visual impact from the coast the quarry is sited 1 mi (2 km) inland, and cut down into the mountain 1,600 ft (500 m) above sea level.

[2] Little is known of the glen before the Viking age when it was part of Dál Riata, a Gaelic over-kingdom of the western seaboard of Scotland, in the late 6th and early 7th century.

[16] In 1930 Arthur Strutt (1908–1977) married Patricia Kebbell (20 October 1911 – July 2000),[17] daughter of a New Zealand sheep farmer, and granddaughter of John Cameron a Scottish cattle drover from Corrychoillie, Spean Bridge having been introduced by his sisters who were attending the same Swiss finishing school.

[16] In 2006 Foster Yeoman was wholly acquired by the Holcim Group and is now part of its Aggregate Industries subsidiary and is no longer family owned.

[2][21] To minimise visual impact from the coast the quarry is sited 1 mi (1.6 km) inland, and cut down into the mountain 1,600 ft (500 m) above sea level.

Each explosive blast dislodges about 70,000 tons of granite, which is transported by dump truck to the primary crusher, which reduces it to lumps no bigger than nine inches in diameter.

At the base of the glory hole, deep inside the mountain, rocks are transferred to a horizontal conveyor and moved through a 1-mile-long (1.6 km) tunnel to the second crusher on the shore, where oceangoing ships are loaded in the deep-water docks at the rate of 6,000 tons per hour.

[2] Reserves of granite are estimated to last at least until the year 2100, when the excavation will have created a new corrie 1+1⁄2 mi (2.4 km) square and 400 ft (120 m) deep.