Norwich ― Robert Davidson and Chris Grasso were pole-vaulting teammates at Montville High School in the 1970s, went to college together but then went their separate ways until the exploits of a fierce, enigmatic Civil War soldier and spy brought them together again.

For years, historian and American history professor Grasso, has been researching and writing about John R. Kelso, a staunch Unionist, Civil War soldier and spy, a Methodist minister turned atheist and post-Civil War congressman turned anarchist late in life.

Grasso has published numerous excerpts of Kelso’s exploits over the years, culminating with “Teacher, Preacher, Soldier, Spy: The Civil Wars of John R. Kelso.” But he said he could not leave the story there.

During the pandemic, Grasso hit on a new way to share Kelso’s story with a wider audience through an illustrated graphic history website. He turned to his old high school teammate, fellow Montville High School Class of 1979 graduate, Davidson, now a 24-year veteran art teacher at Norwich Free Academy.

Davidson said his own artwork is quite different from the stark, black-and-white, hand-drawn illustrations of Kelso’s story. But he recalled his own advice to NFA art students to “step out of their comfort zone.”

Grasso, who lives in Providence, and Davidson of East Haddam, collaborated online and through email exchanges.

“This project really grabbed hold of me and didn’t let go,” Grasso said in an email to The Day. “So much of it was visual, like a film playing in my head. But not having $40 million to turn it into a movie, I asked myself how else could some of these episodes from Kelso’s story be given visual form?”

The two friends surprised each other with the results. As Grasso recounted Kelso’s battles, close calls, capture, imminent execution and escape, Davidson captured minute details of each scene. At the start of the Civil War, Grasso wrote that Kelso was nearly mobbed when he interrupted a Confederate rally in Buffalo, Mo. to shout support for the Union cause. One of his students grabbed him by the hand and dragged him away.

Davidson drew a closeup of Kelso’s arm, a smaller youth’s hand grasping his teacher’s single finger to lead him from the angry mob.

Captured as a spy with the gallows ready, Kelso was helped to escape by a Confederate soldier, Grasso wrote. Davidson drew only the hastily constructed wooden frame, empty noose dangling.

Another image of Kelso trying to sleep on the ground in driving rain shows the spy face down, arms cradled over his head, with every streak of rain aimed at his bare head.

The project begins with a portrait of a long-haired, bearded Kelso in uniform. The soldier vowed not to cut his hair until he had personally killed 25 rebels, a goal he surpassed, Grasso wrote.

The graphic history is portrayed at www.johnrkelso.com, but Davidson wanted a more personal unveiling. Three Rivers Community College agreed to exhibit the 23 illustrations in a gallery show titled “Illustrating John Kelso’s Civil War.”

The show in the second-story gallery at Three Rivers, 574 New London Turnpike, Norwich, is open from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. weekdays through Oct. 5.

On Friday, the two Montville High School grads finally will be together in the same room for the first time in 30 years, for a reception and lecture at 6 p.m. at The Gallery at Three Rivers. The event is free and open to the public. Refreshments will be served.

“I was looking at the illustrations and thought it was a shame not to exhibit them,” Davidson said. “(Grasso) agreed to do lecture and Three Rivers agreed to do the exhibit.”

Grasso, a professor of early American history at Brown University in Providence, first discovered Kelso while researching a weighty topic of skepticism and faith in American history. A library aide in California showed him extensive manuscripts of Kelso’s essays, lectures, poems and an intriguing 140-page, half-finished memoir of his Civil War experiences through 1863.

Years later, still researching accounts of Kelso by late 19th century historians and newspaper stories ― Unionists calling him “hero,” Confederates a “monster” ― Grasso received a surprise phone call from Kelso’s great, great grandson, who possessed more Kelso writings, including the second half of the memoir to 1885.

Kelso died Jan. 26, 1891, literally in mid-sentence of writing, according to Kelso. Davidson’s image places a viewer behind the aged Kelso’s right shoulder, Kelso grasping a pen at a desk cluttered with books and photos depicting key events in Kelso’s life.

“I wanted to be looking over his shoulder, seeing the older Kelso ― the Kelso in the photograph on the desk― from an angle,” Grasso wrote in the website description of the photo. “Throughout this project I had wanted to show Kelso writing. So here we have him, with his ‘Works,’ his memoir, and other papers.”

c.bessette@theday.com