the Theatre Royal, built to replace the old Theatre Royal in Mosley Street and designed by John and Benjamin Green. At the top of Grey Street, Grainger placed the column of Grey’s Monument as a focus for the whole scheme. 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. The whole scheme cost £646,000. The buildings were constructed of high quality materials and faced with stone. They were provided with water-closets and sewers, and Grainger had the streets lit with gas and the road surfaces macadamised. John Dobson is given much of the credit for the detailed design, but other architects also made significant contributions, especially Thomas Oliver and John and Benjamin Green. In addition, much important work was done by two architects in Grainger’s office, John Wardle and George Walker. John Dobson's nephew Gibson Kyle was Grainger's foreman when most of Grainger's and Dobson's major works were carried out. Subsequent career With the completion of his major scheme for central Newcastle, Grainger looked around for another scheme to work on. 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). In this project he commissioned Thomas Sopwith (geologist). The project was stillborn and did not become the Newcastle Central station . The expense of buying the estate almost bankrupted Grainger and by 1841 his creditors were demanding payment. He was saved from bankruptcy by John Clayton, who persuaded Grainger’s creditors to accept gradual repayment. Grainger was forced to live modestly. The riverside section of the Elswick estate was sold to William Armstrong, for a new armaments factory. 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. At his death, his debts totalled £128,582 and his personal estate amounted to only £16,913. However, the sale of land in the Elswick estate helped to pay off these debts to such an extent that by 1901 the Grainger estate was worth over £1,200,000. Grainger’s legacy All three men,