It has become the tradition of the Ampersand Club to send out letterpress invitations to each club meeting and event. During the first 50 years of the Club, meetings were held an average of 3 times a year with announcements coming as letter, hand-written postcard, typed postcard, or simple mimeo-graphed flyer. Letterpress invites were occasionally used for special events during that period. In the 1980s, letterpress invitations became the norm, with meetings increasing from 4 or 5 times a year to the current average of 9 meetings per year.
Over the years the invitations have been printed by a number of leading Twin Cities’ printers and book artists. It has been customary to have the printers not sign their works so they are anonymous to the members. The printers include: Kent Aldrich, Kevin Brown, Mark Digre, Jim Eckman, Norm Fritzberg, Phil Gallo, Hans Koch, Allan Kornblum, Gerry Lange, Paul Maravelas, Russell Maret, Paulette Myers-Rich, Will Powers, Dave Rathman, Rob Rulon-Miller, Gaylord Schanilec, Wilbur “Chip” Schilling, C.B. Sherlock, Richard Stevens, Emily Mason Strayer, Michael Tarachow, Jody Williams, Emerson Wulling, and others. Some of the printers have only printed one or two invitations while others have printed dozens over the years.
More information about the invitations of the Ampersand Club can be found in Cordially Invited: History and Evolution of the Ampersand Club Invitations by John J. Moriarty (2020)