Before the fur traders and missionaries built their awkward cabins along the Grand River, Native Americans inhabited the area. The earliest image most commonly known and used to explain the first white settlement at Grand Rapids is Rev. Booth's 1831 original art work of the Baptist Mission on the west side of the Grand River. Louis Campau, credited as the Father of Grand Rapids, built his trading post on the East Side. Joel Guild's House is documented as one of the earliest structures at the center of what would become Grand Rapids, Michigan. His house, sketched by Turner in 1834, is shown on the rural site of what would be Pearl and Monroe, in Campau Square, at the heart of Grand Rapids. Perhaps the best published source of images of early Grand Rapids construction is Old Grand Rapids : a picture story of old conditions by Geo. E. Fitch, 1925. Coll. 018, the Fitch Photographs Collection, includes many of the historical images collected by Fitch. From these early constructions, Grand Rapids has continued to grow and evolve into a small metropolis, centered on the Grand River, but expanding across county lines, and stretching in all directions. Grand Rapids has suburbs, and experienced the same flight from the city center as other American cities, but today has an active downtown area, as well as a sprawling greater community. The Polk directories and their ilk, which document the addresses of local physical structures, have expanded from a city directory, to a city + suburban directories, to now a Kent County directory. The city core has seen several generations of evolution by 2000, and continues to change. The islands and hills which marked natures construction as of the 1830's were soon reshaped by man. Several different buildings have inhabited some sites, there have been at least two periods of urban renewal. The city has taken a lead in Michigan historical preservation, in reaction to the destruction of the beloved 1888 Old City Hall, and in preservation of the Heritage Hill Historic District east of the downtown. Many of the old furniture factories, left from Grand Rapids 19th century reputation as the Furniture City, are now being rediscovered and reused, along with other historical center city structure.