Henry Harris Reed comes from Italy to spend the summer with an aunt and uncle in New Jersey. His teacher in the American school in Naples—where his father is United States consul—has asked him to keep notes on his experiences, and if possible to "do something that can be used to illustrate free enterprise." Little does she know what a chain of reactions she has touched off!

This book is Henry's private journal (not a diary—"diaries are kept by girls"), in which he gravely records the side-splitting details of his undertakings. To begin with, he tidies up an old barn and paints a sign on the outside: HENRY REED, RESEARCH. Watching him at work, Margaret Glass, the girl next door, says he should add "Pure and Applied" before the word "Research." Henry has a poor opinion of girls in general, but as a businessman he realizes that Margaret knows more or less what she is talking about and just might be useful as a partner.

Eventually the sign reads REED & GLASS, INC., Pure and Applied Research. But before that time comes, a great many people—not to speak of an assortment of animals—have been entangled in an astonishing series of enterprises that could only be called "free"!

Drawings by Robert McCloskey—famous author-artist of the hilarious Homer Price and Centerburg Tales—add the perfect complement of humor to situations in the journal that are sometimes mysterious, often profitable, and always wildly funny.

From the dust jacket