  We present first-season infrared (IR) and optical photometry and spectroscopy
of the Type Ia Supernova 1998bu in M96. We also report optical polarimetry of
this event. SN1998bu is one of the closest type Ia Supernovae of modern times
and the distance of its host galaxy is well-determined. We find that SN1998bu
is both photometrically and spectroscopically normal. However, the extinction
to this event is unusually high, with Av=1.0 +/-0.11. We find that SN1998bu
peaked at an intrinsic Mv=-19.37 +/-0.23. Adopting a distance modulus of 30.25
(Tanvir et al. 1999) and using Phillips et al.'s (1999) relations for the
Hubble constant we obtain Ho=70.4 +/-4.3 km/s/Mpc. Combination of our IR
photometry with those of Jha et al. (1999) provides one of the most complete
early-phase IR light curves for a SN Ia published so far. In particular, SN
1998bu is the first normal SN Ia for which good pre-maximum (in the B band) IR
coverage has been obtained. It reveals that the J, H and K light curves peak
about 5 days earlier than the flux in the B-band curve.
