A steam engine locomotes itself through Kelly Poling’s consciousness. And old buildings have modern facades stripped to reveal ornate woodwork and bygone transoms.

And, for him, a bare-brick canvas.

The artist likes the stuff of aged photographs, faces and places preserved in black and white. He values an era when structures had arched windows, beautiful glasswork and architecture with no fascination for clean lines.

“I probably have an old soul,” Mr. Poling says, smiling. “I should have been born 100 years ago.”

Yet he has himself in a modern enterprise, that of civic makeover. Small communities, like his adopted home of Chillicothe, look for an edge in pursuit of continuing viability. Using Mr. Poling’s gifts, the Livingston County town has come to see its rich history displayed in murals.

Not just a few, either. Since the Chillicothe Development Corp. commissioned him for the first project in 2000, the artist has completed 16 murals, with number 17 now in the works.

The paintings have become visual chapters of Chillicothe’s past, a record in sharp hues of agricultural origins, early institutions and businesses that shaped the place. Drivers on North Washington Street need not slow much to learn the city’s role as “the home of sliced bread.”

Amy Supple, director of the Greater Chillicothe Visitors Region, calls the murals “breathtaking.”

“Together, they tell the story of Chillicothe’s history,” she says. “We’re very fortunate to have him and them in our community, aesthetically and from a tourism standpoint.”

Mr. Poling’s presence in the town seems a matter of fate. He grew up in Omaha, a lad good at art but more involved in sports. The Kansas City Royals showed interest in his baseball abilities, but he ended up a scholarship pitcher at the University of Arkansas.

His arm gave out, and he returned to Nebraska to finish his degree. There, the noted painter Keith Jacobshagen proved an inspiration.

“I always took art as a backup because it was so easy for me,” Mr. Poling recalls. “I never thought I would make anything of it.”

After getting his bachelor of fine arts degree, he settled in Lincoln, painting and designing menus for a local restaurant. Eventually, he took an ownership stake, but he got bored after three years in the food industry. He headed west.

In Las Vegas, Palace Station casino was renovating. Kelly holed up in a condo owned by his parents and worked on steam train art he hoped to present to designers. Just as he prepared to give up, a call came, then an interview. He showed the designers 10 pieces, and they bought four on the spot, commissioning another half-dozen.

When work dried up, he moved to southern Missouri, where his father semi-retired to a ranch. Pastures became his workspace.

Through mutual friends, he met Angela, a psychologist in Monett, Mo. She looked through his art portfolio and asked, “What are you doing raising cattle?”

You marry a woman like that. “She was my inspiration for getting out there and doing it,” Mr. Poling says.

Angela got a job offer to become a psychologist at the women’s prison in her hometown, Chillicothe. They moved to the community in 1997, and he opened his studio and framing shop, Original Artworks by Kelly, the next year.

When the idea floated for local murals, Mr. Poling finessed his experience only slightly. After all, Kelly was once paid $350 for artwork he painted on a pig farmer’s Quonset hut.

With the murals, he works from old photographs, melding faces and buildings into a single vision. He measures the wall and gets a sense of nearby traffic flow. The resulting design has a grid placed atop it, a checkerboard that puts the large-scale art into manageable bits.

The artist uses latex paint, which breathes more easily with the extreme Missouri weather. It’s flat paint because semi-gloss creates a glare, and it has a high UV-protection rating to prevent fading.

Mr. Poling concentrates on light and shadow, the better for effects of depth. The style is called trompe l’oeil, a technique to fool the eye. He speaks in awe of a muralist acquaintance whose work causes birds to fly into the sky painted on brick walls.

He views the work from up close, on his own lift truck, and from 200 yards back, knowing the finished product will be seen at both distances.

A resident of a dozen years, Mr. Poling marvels at the local support for public art and the enthusiasm his work generates. “I never felt more at home than I have here,” he says. “With these people backing you, I come to play every day.”

While painting, he lowers his lift to talk to school groups or an inquiring passer-by. Several times a year, he boards a bus of tourists for a circuit of the murals and a personal lecture of the history behind them. He calls himself “a semi-teacher.”

Immersed in the past, the artist seems in his element.

Ken Newton can be reached at kenn@npgco.com.