I tried hooking up my father's turntable to my existing stereo so I would have a better one to use. I hooked everything up properly and plugged it in, but when I turned on the stereo to play a record I had to turn the volume ALL the way up to hear it at a decent volume. There isnt a volume on the turntable either. My dad says I need to buy a receiver... is that what I need or is there some special trick to hooking up a turntable?

You need a special kind of input called a phono jack. Many recievers today have them. It's a specific kind of amplification for record players. You will need it to get it to sound right.

If your receiver doesn't have phono inputs, you can buy a preamp for it that does the same thing.