Field Notes: Lucky

Field Notes’ 70th Quarterly Edition, Lucky, celebrates the humble US penny and its more than 200-year history as it bids farewell to a coin that has become part of everyday life.

The edition takes inspiration from the changing appearance of copper over time, with three cover colours representing different stages of wear and oxidation: the warm orange-pink of Rosewood, well-worn Mocha, and the green patina of Mint. Each cover is made from 100-lb Mohawk Mosaic stock, finished with metallic copper foil and embossed on the back with three historic penny designs: the wheat stalks, Lincoln Memorial and Great Seal.

Inside, copper staples bind 48 pages of 60#T Domtar Cougar Natural paper. The ruled pages feature copper lines and faint mint-coloured ledger columns, which can be used for lists, calculations and checklists — or simply ignored for everyday writing.

The reverse of each pack’s backing card features a heartfelt tribute to the cent, along with a space to keep your own lucky penny. Whether it’s from the final batch minted in 2025 or one you found years ago, it’s a fitting little celebration of a coin that’s been part of American life for generations.

Specifications:

1. Proudly printed by the good people of Classic Color, Broadview, Ill.
2. Covers: Mohawk Mosaic 100#C “Rosewood,” “Mocha,” and “Mint,” hot-foil stamped with “Shiny Penny Copper.”
3. Innards: Domtar Cougar Natural 60#T “Natural,” with a fine, 2-color application of “Heads Up” and “Oxidized” soy-based Superior inks.
4. Cover and innards printed on a Komori Lithrone 640 six-color UV printing press.
5. Bound with a Muller Martini Presto II saddle stitcher with appreciation to Samuel Slocum, George W. McGill, and William J. Brown, the “Founding Fathers of the Staple.”
6. Corners precisely rounded to a 3/8" (9.5mm) radius with a Challenge DCM double round-corner machine.
7. Ledger lines spaced at 1/4" (6.4mm).
8. Memo book dimensions are 3-1/2" × 5-1/2" (89mm × 140mm).
9. FIELD NOTES uses only the Futura typeface family (Paul Renner, 1927), in collaboration with Monotype.
10. All FIELD NOTES memo books are printed and manufactured in the U.S.A.
11. Limited Edition of 30,000 3-Packs.