Henry Allerdale Grainger

Henry Allerdale Grainger (7 August 1848 – 17 December 1923), generally known as Allerdale Grainger, nicknamed "Ally", was an Australian investor, accountant, editor and polemicist who briefly held a seat in the South Australian Legislative Council. and represented the South Australian House of Assembly multi-member seat of Wallaroo from 1884 to 1885 and from 1890 to 1901, then served as State Agent in London.

Allerdale Grainger, whose full name may have been Henry William Allerdale Grainger, was born in England the youngest son of Henry Grainger (1 April 1801 – 20 November 1889) of High Ireby, Cumberland, and nephew of John Grainger (c. 1803–1872). He was educated at Rugby school, and followed his father as a speculator on the Stock Exchange, but with mixed results. He sailed to America, where he had some success as a journalist.

Allerdale sailed to South Australia on the Hesperus, landing at Port Adelaide in September 1876. He soon made himself known through well-written articles in the local newspapers on subjects as diverse as Emigration agents in England and the workers they recruit, Christmas at the North Pole, Artesian wells and Government auctions. He held a public meeting, chaired by W. C. Buik, on the subject of Chinese immigration (he was against it, except to the Northern Territory), at which he signalled his parliamentary ambitions, to a small and rowdy audience who showed the chairman much more respect than the speaker.

The political parties of the day had settled on the free trade model, and there was little to choose between the two newspapers (The Advertiser and The Register). Grainger upset this cozy state of affairs with his outspoken advocacy for protectionism, which he had picked up in America, then in June 1877 founded his own penny weekly newspaper, the Australian Star. The paper was fresh and opinionated, and disrespectful of "establishment" figures and opinions. A regular feature of the paper was an editorial opinion piece "Both Sides of the Wall, by the Man on Top". Australian Star was the first to publish poems by Victor Daley. It was in terms of circulation quite successful, but Grainger was not a man to stick to a task long enough for it to be profitable and some three years later it had new owners and management.

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