His first important contract was in 1819, to build a group of houses in Higham Place for Alderman Batson, a prominent Newcastle Methodist.

Grainger's first step was to buy the Anderson Place from the executors of the estate for £50,000, as well as other additional property for £45,000, but he could not afford to finance the development himself.

He was advised to move his legal account to the solicitor's firm run by John Clayton, the town clerk.

There were objections to the scheme on the grounds that it would involve the demolition of the Theatre Royal in Mosley Street and the Flesh Market, which was less than thirty years old.

Grainger had plans for a new Guildhall and Courts at the top of Grey Street, above the Theatre Royal, but these were rejected and he built a large bank there instead.

They were provided with water-closets and sewers, and Grainger had the streets lit with gas and the road surfaces macadamised.

In addition, much important work was done by two architects in Grainger's office, John Wardle and George Walker.

In 1839 he paid £114,100 for the Elswick estate to the west of Newcastle intending to build a railway terminus there surrounded by factories and houses (see plan reproduced above).

He was saved from bankruptcy by John Clayton,[9] who persuaded Grainger's creditors to accept gradual repayment.

Grainger built a number of streets of terraced houses, in Benwell and Elswick, for the workers at Armstrong's factory, and named several of them using the forenames of his thirteen children.

Grainger died in 1861 at his home at 5 Clayton Street West and is buried at St James Church, Benwell.

[5] All three men, Grainger, Dobson and Clayton, deserve recognition for the creation of the centre of Newcastle in the Neoclassical style.

It is unfortunate that in the sixties, in the push for modernisation, most of Eldon Square and about a quarter of the original scheme were demolished to make way for modern buildings.