The Ferry Stores - 2

The Ferry Stores is built along the north side of the Ormsaigbeg road, close to the jetty. From west to east, it consists of the gas compound, in which Calor Gas and coal is stored; a wooden garage, mainly used for storage; the main house, built as a dwelling and shop by Lachlan Cameron in 1912, with a newer extension to the east; the existing shop; a large store room; and, on the south, sea-side of the road, the petrol station and small service building.

The gas enclosure was, for many years, a chicken run, though it also gave access to the back of the property where a lorry was kept in the 1930s. What is now the garage was a store room, built as a lean-to on the end of the house, later used as a shed for feedstuffs.

Most of the area of the existing shop was a 'coalree' where coal, brought ashore from ships which beached near the jetty, was kept. The main structure of the store room dates back to the 1930s. It had three sliding doors - the runners for one are still visible - and various uses: a store, a garage with three bays in which were kept a lorry and a car, and a place for making coffins - it was a tradition that the owner of the shop was also the local undertaker.

The petrol station dates from 1921. The original structure was slightly to the west of the present one, and consisted of a wooden shed for the till, lubricating oils and spare parts, an overground tank for diesel, and two underground tanks for petrol. There is a story that the petrol tanks were made from steel salvaged from the German battleships which were scuttled in Scapa Flow at the end of the first world war. They must have been good because they lasted until 1999, when they were condemned because they appeared to be leaking.

Lachlan Cameron continued his ferry business as well as running the shop. By the first world war he was operating a motor boat called 'the Coffin' because he was prepared to take it out in any weather. He gave up the ferry in the late 1940s, when MacBraynes started a regular service from Mingary Pier to Tobermory.

Lachlan died in 1949.