he always knew the great magician howard thurston inspired his dad to dabble in magic. this one letter, he learns that the great magician also started him collecting. >> he talked about how howard thurston gave him his first book. >> so, now you get a little nugget. >> i did. that was really one of my first clues. >> rex has little clue about the importance of his dad's acquisitions. to understand that, you'd have to be well-versed in the dark arts. >> a lot of them were seen actually as occult books, and people were a little scared of them. ray ricard, a rare-book collector, says rex's inheritance includes some of the oldest magic books in existence. >> some books actually had handwritten prayers that were put in the front of the book that were required to be read before you could actually open the book. >> like "the history of magick," published in 1657... >> the spelling of the word "magic" is m-a-g-i-c-k, which indicates books that are related to the occult, if you will, so superstition, some spiritualism, witchcraft. there's also "hocus pocus in perfection," publis