Some knew Ricky Jay as a magician, a renowned sleight-of-hand artist who could manipulate cards with superhuman dexterity. Others discovered him as an actor, in films such as Magnolia or the HBO series Deadwood. What’s more, Jay somehow found time to become an accomplished author—Learned Pigs & Fireproof Women, and Jay’s Journal of Anomalies—guides to the perplexing and chronicles of the world’s more bizarre entertainments. Jay was also—not finally, but in addition—an eminent collector; among the foremost collectors of texts, artworks, and apparatuses related to magic, its history, and all…
