LOL, we must be the old timers who remember such things.
Back when the estate tax exemption was $600K, I had an elderly woman come to me with $2 million in bearer bonds asking what they were. Her husband had been clipping them and he died.
No one in the family knew.
I had her strip off all the coupons and gift the present value of the principle using two safe deposit boxes. Took a few years, but saved about a million in taxes.