The most interesting aspect of this book for me was the touring automobile. I liked learning what a well-to-do family could travel in before there were RVs. It certainly seemed to be a well-equiped car (minus a bathroom and shower, of course.) During the first -- short -- trip in the new vehicle, Honey Bunch acquires a toy rabbit that will play a part in the rest of the book.

The neighborhood kids are impressed with Mr. Morton's new car. Many of them get taken on a picnic in it. (Given today's littering laws, I can't entirely approve of Mrs. Morton's plan to keep the kids from getting lost in the woods while the food's getting ready.)

During the picnic Honey Bunch has the novelty of meeting a boy who is an uncle even though he's not much older than his nieces and nephews. They have difficulty believing he can possibly be an uncle at his age. He's not even old enough to wear long pants yet. The poor boy was named for an ancient general. Hope that didn't get him too many snickers in school.

Before the Mortons leave Norman will have an accident that will be harder on him than the back fence. He'll also commit a well-intentioned act that will cause Lady Clare, Honey Bunch's cat, to be lost.

The Mortons' trip will include a night of being stuck in a ditch and a flat tire. Still, they do have a short visit at Uncle Rand's farm where they give cousin Stub a lift to her Great-Aunt Molly's. The girls get to see a gypsy camp.

There's fun at the campgrounds, anxiety when Honey Bunch gets lost in the woods, and a re-union with acquaintances from a previous book before the family gets home again.

My copy of Honey Bunch: Her First Auto Tour is a 1950s re-issue which means it has the uniform Harry Lane dust jacket showing blue-eyed blonde Honey Bunch in a pink dress and brown-eyed, black-haired Norman Clark in a white or light blue short-sleeved shirt and long blue pants. The end-papers (also drawn by Harry Lane?) have a big tree in the center with Honey Bunch and Norman on the left. They're laughing at a monkey that is sitting on the grass and holding a baby doll in each arm. To the right another little girl is kneeling on the grass. She's holding her hand over her mouth but you can tell that she's laughing, too. To the far right is a toy express wagon which appears to have a cage in it.
The thing I dislike most about this re-issue is that it doesn't even bother to include the Walter S. Rogers frontispiece. Perhaps the publisher thought that it would look too old-fashioned. On the other hand, the boards of the cover are a lovely blue-green. The boards don't have the tiny grid texture of the thick red editions or one tan edition I have, nor the little wavy lines made of dots texture of two thin red editions and two tan editions I have. They look pretty smooth.

There are entries in this series that I like better, but this one isn't a bad way to pass some time. ( )