Here’s the schedule of activities for the Lowell Celebrates Kerouac! festival, which starts on Thursday, Oct. 6, and runs through the Columbus Day holiday on Oct. 10.

Note that on Thursday, Oct. 6, at 5 pm, there will be a ribbon-cutting ceremony and reception to officially open the new permanent exhibit about Kerouac at the Lowell National Historical Park Visitor Center. The display introduces people to Kerouac’s life and literature and orients them to the Kerouac literary places in Lowell. This is the project that UMass Lowell Prof. Mike Millner and I worked on for the past year with Park Service staff David Blackburn and Jack Herlihy. To do this, Mike and I were awarded a grant from the Creative Economy Initiative of the UMass President’s Office. John Sampas of the Kerouac Estate generously provided certain images and permission to reprint book excerpts. For the smaller Visitor Center space, Chris Danemeyer of Proun Design adapted the look he created for the “On the Road” scroll manuscript exhibit at the Boott Mills Gallery in 2007.