Stock Accounts

[Mike Kobler]

GnuCash gurus,

First I would like to thank everyone involved with the GnuCash development
on a job well done.  I have done away entirely with Quicken and now use
GnuCash exclusively.  (Though it only happened when the latest version of
wine run quicken 5.0 poorly to force me :)

My question is about Stock Accounts.  I have participated in a stock
purchase plan through my employer for the last few years.  Seeing as I
just started using GnuCash this year, I figured I would start my accounts
on 1/1/2000.  How do I go about accounting for stock I purchases in
previous years??  For my checking, I used the equity account to have a
non-zero opening balance.  Do I do the same sort of thing for
Stocks??  How about the "cost" to purchase those stocks??  Where does that
go??

Sorry to ask so many questions, becuase I'm sure the answer is simple when
an example is provided.  (If there is already an example somewhere, please
let me know!!)

thanks again,
mike