It's amazing that, as closely tied thematically as they are, no one ever thought to pair the work of photographer Robert Frank with "On the Road" author Jack Kerouac before.

The exhibit opening Thursday at the Indianapolis Museum of Art, "On the Road Again with Jack Kerouac and Robert Frank," does just that. It features the original manuscript of the watershed novel, on the 120-foot scroll that Kerouac famously banged out in three weeks, as well as all 83 photographs that appeared in Frank's "The Americans."

Both were inspired by years spent traveling the highways and byways of the nation, detailing an America lonelier and more bitter than the "Ozzie & Harriet" image of the 1950s.

"It was a natural pairing in our minds," said Martin Krause, the IMA's curator of prints, drawings and photographs. "They're both of the same era. The author and the photographer had the same sort of idea that they would chronicle America by doing cross-country odysseys."

Colts owner Jim Irsay, who bought the scroll at a 2001 auction for $2.43 million, said he spoke with filmmaker Cameron Crowe and "gonzo" journalist Hunter S. Thompson -- both of whom were heavily influenced by Kerouac -- about its literary importance before purchasing it. He calls the scroll the "Holy Grail" of the Beats.

Rather than put it in a vault somewhere, Irsay has sent "On the Road" on a trip around the globe, including Rome, England and multiple U.S. stops. This is its first display in Indianapolis.

"To me, it was always about getting it out to the people and getting it on the road," Irsay said. "It's definitely taken on a life of its own. It's allowed other artists to gather around it and create a legacy and more art."

There will be a free opening concert from 7 to 9 p.m. Thursday featuring David Amram, a composer and jazz musician and key Beat figure, who will be joined by local musicians.

Kerouac wrote "On the Road" in long coffee- and drug-fueled stretches. He chose to feed long sheets of tracing paper through his typewriter so he wouldn't have to interrupt his 100-word-a-minute binges.

"The sheets of paper were wider than the typewriter, so he had to crop them down. It's much like the road itself. It looks like the road," Krause said.

"What goes unsaid is that Kerouac had been working on this for five years previously, and kept voluminous notes of his cross-country jaunts and made a lot of false starts as to the writing of the book. So it wasn't like it just came to him as sort of an inspiration."

The man in charge of the scroll is Jim Canary, head of conservation at Indiana University's Lilly Library. In addition to preserving it, Canary is responsible for transporting the scroll around the world in a specially made protective box that he takes with him on planes.

"Jim (Irsay) calls me the Keeper of the Scroll, or Scrollmaster," Canary chuckled.

Canary himself is an ardent fan of Beat writers, even going so far as to replicate Kerouac's feat of traveling to California on $50 -- three times. Like Kerouac, he also later become fascinated by Buddhism and Eastern philosophy.

"Kind of my whole life I've patterned after a main character in another one of his books, 'The Dharma Bums.' That was Japhy Ryder, who was in real life Gary Snyder, who just won the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize," Canary said.

Special display cases were built for the scroll that can be assembled in different lengths to display the entire length of it horizontally, or partially, according to the parameters of the venue. For the IMA, the first 84 feet will be on display initially, and the remainder will be unrolled starting Aug. 11.

Despite the delicacy of the tracing paper, the scroll is in remarkably good shape, with some roughness around the edges and few repairs.

Observers can see the names of Beat figures like Neal Cassady and Allen Ginsberg in their original form, before the publisher insisted they be changed to avoid the threat of libel. There are thousands of Kerouac's hand-written changes in pencil, and even fingerprints.

"On the Road" and "The Americans" were published within months of each other. While "On the Road" was an immediate phenomenon, essentially launching what would become known as the Beat Generation, "The Americans" took longer to gain recognition. It sold only a few hundred copies its first year in the U.S.

Kerouac and Frank met in New York in 1957 shortly after Frank completed his two-year trek across the States.

Frank showed his photos to Kerouac, who responded, "Sure, I can write something about these pictures."

What Kerouac wrote became the foreword for the U.S. edition of "The Americans."