When he reached the age of 83, carpenter/builder Isaac Rapp was said to be the oldest man in Carbondale. That was in 1913, the year of his death, and the fact that he was thought to be the most senior male tells us a good deal about longevity in those days.

Rapp had arrived in Daniel Harmon Brush's new town in 1856, just in time to set about building Daniel's $10,000 house, complete with the necessary outbuildings and a pigpen. The city fathers did not look with disfavor on swine in those days. Isaac was then a young man of 26.

When the house was finished, Daniel set Isaac to building the Presbyterian Church. After some delay because money ran out, it was finally completed at a cost of $2,934.15. Daniel had put up $1,498.24 of the total, and you can be sure he was eventually repaid. Yankees keep careful books.

Even though Isaac had four children in 1861, he joined the Union Army when the Civil War broke out. Like Daniel, he served two years. After his Army service, he fathered five more children. One of Isaac's daughters, Harriett, eventually married Daniel Harmon Brush Jr.

Isaac remained in Carbondale after the war and built and helped build many more homes and public structures. He was involved in the construction of the first "Old Main" on the Southern Illinois University Normal campus. He built the Williamson County Courthouse and enlarged the Jackson County Courthouse. The Rapp family home was at 406 W. Main St., in a block of distinguished homes.

Isaac's most notable and pleasing house in Carbondale was the Chapman home. It was truly an impressive and charming structure. Eventually the First Baptist Church was built beside it to the east, and the Chapman house became the Church's parsonage. Later it was called "the Baptist annex." It was allowed to deteriorate and was taken down after the mid-20th century.

Isaac Rapp's last building in Carbondale was the First Presbyterian Church that still stands at University Avenue and Elm Street. Four of his sons had become licensed architects. One of the four, C. Ward Rapp, designed the church along the lines of a "kirk" he had seen in Scotland. The stone in the church was quarried and cut near Boskydell Road. The church was dedicated in 1905. C. Ward became a partner in an architectural firm in Chicago that designed more than 400 theaters across the United States.

Before the word Normal was dropped from the university's name, the avenue the First Presbyterian Church faced was known as Normal Avenue. As late as 1895, it had been called Missouri Avenue. Other streets in Carbondale have had their names altered as time has gone by. What is now Illinois Avenue was West Street. Today's Jackson Street was known as North Street, Monroe Street was South Street, and Washington Avenue was East Street.

The town was not as large during the 19th century as it has since become. In 1895, the last street on the west side was Springer, while Oak Street was the last on the north, Wall Street the last on the east, and Mill Street the last on the south. Beyond those streets was open country. This writer in the 1930s hunted rabbits and quail between Forest Street and Oakland Avenue. The latter was a country lane, sometimes impassable in winter.

Development of the coal fields to the east in the 1890s brought accelerated growth to Carbondale, a railroad town in an era when locomotives burned coal and hauled it to distant places for others to use. If he returned to the scene today, due to the changing of street names and the expanding of city boundaries, Isaac Rapp would have difficulty finding his way about.

David Kenney was the Illinois historic preservation officer from 1977 to 1984. His latest book is "French Gold: A Novella of the Illinois Country." He continues to make his home in Carbondale.