Spread across three floors of the restored structured, the American Museum of Magic is filled from wall to wall, ceiling to floor, with props from all of the greatest magicians of the 19th and 20th centuries. It's the largest magic museum in the United States that is open to the public.
Half a million pieces of memorabilia are crammed inside of the museum. Among the pieces are more than 10,000 books, 24,000 magazines, 46,000 photographs, letters, more than 2,000 handbills. One of the highlights is an escape apparatus used by Houdini.
What makes the collection more impressive is that most of it was assembled by one man, the late Robert Lund. A Detroit-based writer, Lund was obsessed with magic, but learned early on that he didn't have what it takes. Instead of embarrassing himself as a failed magician, Lund decided he would become the foremost student of magic history and collect everything related to the art that he could get his hands on.
The separate research center for aspiring magicians and historians of magic includes more than one million archived pieces, including a 50,000-volume library.
