I am in possession of one ounce of 99.9% pure silver. The coin is an American Silver Eagle , purchased to commemorate the birth of my son (technically the coin is his, hence my reluctance to use the word "own" in the opening sentence). It's big. It's beautiful. It makes a clinking sound unlike any US coin since the early '60s. It also has a face value of one US dollar, but don't be fooled. A silver dollar is worth more than $1.00. Because of the silver content, a silver dollar is worth at least $19.34 as of this writing. Factor in variables like year of production, etc and the value will increase. You may be asking why. The answer is simple: Silver, and even more so, gold, is money, and has been for 5000 years. The paper in your wallet is currency, issued by a government, reliant on the stability of and peoples' faith in said government. It wasn't always this way. Coins have been free of silver since the mid-1960s, Nixon took the US dolla...