"You shall give yourself to some kind of work . . ."

Our work is as varied as the talents of the sisters who compose our community.  It is a way of joining in solidarity with all those whose daily labor is necessary for their survival; it is a means of our financial support; and it is a way to share our Carmelite spirituality with the wider community.

Even before the sisters came to Nevada, there was a hint of the work that would become a source of income for the monastery and would put the Carmel of Reno logo on some 100,000 cards each year.
Our founding Carmel (the Carmel of Indianapolis) endeavored to earn a living with the manufacture of altar breads and vestment making.  In the early 50’s miscellaneous crafts were pursued to help with expenses.  A hand fed multilith duplicator was used to create cards for novenas, which were sent to people who asked for prayers.  Sr. Anne Clem, one of the Founding Sisters of Reno Carmel was among the first to learn how to operate “the mechanical monster,” little realizing this would presage something for our future.

When Bishop Dwyer (our Founding Bishop) was touring the Indianapolis Carmel prior to the foundation he saw the printing being done there and, when asked if there would be work in the Diocese that the Sisters could do, he replied affirmatively.  The Reno Diocese was, for all practical purposes, almost mission territory and support was maintained through a fund-raising mail operation, ‘The Frontier of the Faith’. The office was managed by the sisters’ chaplain, Monsignor Anderson, who employed the sisters in stuffing, mailing and addressing the envelopes.  More importantly for the evolution of the Carmel of Reno Printshop, the nuns did a little printing of prayer leaflets for the mailings. 
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The first print shop was the garage behind the house at 829 North Virginia.  John Cavilia furnished it with a 1250 multilith, a large work table and a hand operated guillotine cutter.  In addition to the equipment, John taught the first sisters the art of printing. In July of 1958 the move to the permanent monastery offered much needed space for the printing work.  Although the wing for the print shop was not built (due to lack of funds), the storage areas on the ground floor were spacious enough to house everything and even provided a darkroom, a place to expose and develop plates and an area for layout and stripping negatives.  Primitive as it all was, it was still great progress compared to the Virginia Street garage arrangement.

From the time people knew that the sisters had a press, (late 1954 on) we were asked to do small “job work”: letterheads for businesses (like Vaughan Millwork), business cards, invoices, etc.  This was just straight duplicating work for friends who were our plumbers, electricians, grocers, etc. More adventurous were the half tone pictures of graduating classes for St. Thomas and Snows, printing for the altar society and fund-raiser events such as fashion show ads for Churches and schools.
In addition to the “job work” some creative printing was also done, which in hindsight, paved the way for our Carmel of Reno Cards.  In 1954 the sisters’ attorney, Morgan Anglim asked if we would print the drawing an artist friend had done for him.  Craig Shepard’s Santa Claus came out beautifully.  From that first card an idea was born and the next years saw a wonderful flowering of our greeting cards ministry.