A MONTHLY UPDATE FROM INSIDE FIELD NOTES
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Hi, it’s Jim from Field Notes. This is our tenth monthly newsletter containing a variety of stuff that doesn’t really fit anywhere else. Please respond to this email if you have comments, questions, or suggestions. |
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TLDR Version: Back Pockets, Isbell, Write On, Free Pack of Whack, Treasure Map, Around My Brain, Charmed I’m Sure, Compendiums. |
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In the early 1900s it was common for seed, fertilizer, and various other American agricultural companies to produce custom notebooks to hand out as promotional items to independent farmers. These tended to be rugged, easy to fit in a back pocket, and useful for recording planting plans, results, purchases, sales and the like. |
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These little vintage Memo Books are the original inspiration for Field Notes. Sometimes directly, like with the “National Crop” Edition from 2012, “America the Beautiful” from 2013, and our more recent (and still available) “Heartland” Edition. But always, with a simple form factor, and made in the USA from durable materials. “Honest products worth fillin’ up with good information.” |
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Aaron Draplin’s original Field Notes design was the result of years spent collecting these farmer’s books. “One thing I want you to think about is that this is what pocket material looked like to the American farmer. When you look at the type and the color and the general spirit, this was the start of us building Field Notes.” |
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“Some guy actually lived out of this thing. His handwriting will be there through all these years. A guy’s life and how he documented it all. That’s what these things mean to me. Regular people working really hard.” |
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Tell the Truth Enough, You’ll Find it Rhymes with Everything
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Solid advice from a solid guy. From “Be Afraid” off the album Reunions by Jason Isbell and the 400 Unit. |
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The three books can be broken down into the three elements of Jason’s musical process: “Songwriting,” “Making the Music,” and “Sharing It On The Road.” On the cover of the middle book, you’ll see his beloved “Red Eye” 1959 Les Paul up close and in action. |
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While they last, these 3-Packs will be available at the merch table at Jason’s shows and we have some available here at the site. |
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We’ve talked multiple times in these Staple Day mailings and in other places, about our Field Notes tag line, “I’m not writing it down to remember it later, I’m writing it down to remember it now,” and how that concept relates to our observation that writing something down by hand imprints it in our brains in a stronger, more memorable way than by typing it on a keyboard or tapping it into a hand-held device. And, thanks to a recently published study1 we now have verifiable scientific proof. |
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“The present findings suggest that the intricate and precisely controlled handwriting movements have a beneficial impact on the brain’s connectivity patterns related to learning and remembering. The present study did not find evidence of such positive activation patterns when using a keyboard.” |
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1. F. R. (Ruud) Van der Weel and Audrey L. H. Van der Meer. 2024. “Handwriting but not typewriting leads to widespread brain connectivity: a high-density EEG study with implications for the classroom.” Frontiers in Psychology, Vol. 14 -2023. Developmental Neuroscience Laboratory, Department of Psychology, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway. |
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We get mail. “While I use my Field Notes for everything and anything (lists, recipes, sketches and more), I feel that this page is most in the spirit of Field Notes. I drew a map of where the wild strawberries were growing in the forest behind our summer house so I know where to go berry picking next week. The notebook is Ghost Flower from the ‘Signs of Spring’ Edition.” Thanks Urška. |
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Ira Glass: Normally, she doesn't show these lists to anybody. She’ll just notice something about herself, and then she’ll notice a second example of the same thing. And she starts to collect them so she can stare at the list, try to understand it. |
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Aviva DeKornfeld: I’m just trying to make sense of who I am and what is going on in my brain. |
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AD: Yeah, because it’s so organized and clear and clean. And I’ve found the business of making sense of yourself is extremely messy. |
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IG: And the fact that it’s collected on a list, what feeling does that give you? |
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AD: Oh, my God. It’s like relief. It’s so nice because it’s just bouncing around in my brain. And so once it’s on a list, I don’t feel like I have to remember it. |
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IG: But it isn’t just like you don’t have to think about it. It's like you don’t have to worry about it. Before you put it on the list, it seems like there’s a kind of fretting of, like, what does this mean about me that this is a thing? And then once you put it on the list, you know what it means. It means it’s on this list. |
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AK: Yeah, totally. That’s true. Like I exist, and this is a thing about me. |
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From the moment we met the crew at Solemn Oath Brewery we knew we were kindred spirits. Our initial meeting was in their Chicago Tap Room and the agenda was all business. Jokes, wise-cracking and lots of beer tasting business. |
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Like Field Notes, Solemn Oath takes their work seriously, but they’re not overly serious about it. We left that meeting ready to create a limited-edition beer that celebrates summer and Chicago. Our idea was to create a beer and a brand that might have been around for a long time. Think of it as a brand with history, updated for today’s tastes. A Charming Beer. |
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Party: Solemn Oath and Field Notes present A Charming Beer. It’s a delicious, refreshing, easy-drinking “Lawn Chair Ale” and it makes its debut this Saturday, June 29th. Join us for a Charming release party and Field Notes Pop-Up Shop from ####### at Solemn Oath, 2919 W. Armitage Ave where all are welcomed and no tickets are required. |
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We’ll share more shortly, including where to buy the beer in the Chicago area, and a 2-Pack of Memo Books we made to accompany the cold, crushable 4-Packs. “The More You Enjoy, the Charminger You Get.” |
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Here’s this month’s contest. Send us a photo of a page in one of your Field Notes that contains a list. It could be a shopping list, a tally of books read, tacos tasted, vegetables planted, birds spotted, beers quaffed, etc. Pretty much anything will do. We’ll choose fifteen winners, write their names in a Field Notes, and post a picture of that list on the site. Each of the winners will receive a nice Box-o-Swag, including something rare from the archives. |
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Our summer limited-edition packs are on press right now, we can’t wait for you to see, and use them. BTW, we are not working on Fridays during the summer, we’re just screwing around 25% less on Mondays through Thursdays. Thanks for reading. |
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* Coined a long time ago in the Field Nuts Facebook group, “Staple Day” is traditionally observed when a writer reaches the exact middle of a Field Notes Memo Book, revealing the metal fasteners which bind the cover and the interior pages together. |
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