I'm signed up for a continuing ed course at the local college -Guadalcanal. I'm reading Richard Frank's book on the Solomons campaigns where we took the offensive to the Japanese - and won. The maps are too small so I'm interested in getting some large scale (wall mount) maps of Guadalcanal & the Solomons Islands.
Regarding gold, in my case pre-1933 U.S. coins, they interest me from the POV of having intrinsic value while paper money has none of that quality. When I go to my safety deposit box I bring a plastic bag with a kitchen scale to weight the plastic bag that holds the coin collection. When last weighed it was 3 pounds 4 ounces. Gold coin alloy is 90% gold & 10% copper. So doing the math with the conversion to troy ounces, I got $66,550 as the 'melt weight.' This is the value if all the coins were melted into an ingot. Of course, the coins themselves are worth much more as collectibles - age, quality, etc.
I also collect silver, in my case pre-1965 dimes & quarters. They have 90% silver & 10% copper. Two plastic boxes that I have hidden away contain 32 pounds of these worth over $6,000 based on the market value of silver, which has been climbing with our crazy current government. (After 1964 they cut out the silver in those coins).
As an example, a dime that was worth $0.10 in 1964 is today worth a $1.40. A dollar bill printed in the same year is still worth only $1.