John Grainger

Grainger was educated at Belfast Academy and Trinity College, Dublin.

After gaining a Doctorate of Divinity he became Rector of Broughshane, County Antrim.

He was an indiscriminating collector, who filled his house with a mass of often unlabelled specimens including stuffed birds, shells, insects, coins, minerals, a dolmen, weapons from New Zealand, and archaeological finds.

According to Robert Lloyd Praeger his collection of Irish stone tools was ‘’especially valuable as a study in the gentle art of forgery’’.

Partial list He was a member of the Royal Irish Academy and of the Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society and the Belfast Naturalists' Field Club.