Dad left me some mining stock that he had held for so long that there's no cost basis available for them. They've languished for years in a brokerage account. He had bought them on the advice of a marginal financial advisor from Canada named Verne Myers, who did time for buying and holding gold bullion for Americans before the restrictions were lifted in the early 1970s. Thank God I kept them; I'm taking a beating on energy and transportation.

Myers' books, The Coming Deflation, Money & Energy and World Rollover are worth a read if you can find them.