Today Brad, contractor extraordinare, came over & we made a game plan for doing the renovation. Then the rest of the afternoon we did demo, starting with the downstairs bathroom. He did some of the bigger things I don't know how to do myself (removing toilet, shutting off water & removing sink) while I starting pulling down the wall paneling.
I'm noticing a trend with surfaces in this house. Seems that every previous owner has added a layer of paint (or 2 or 10), flooring, wall, or ceiling without removing the one that came before it. The result over the 99 years is that there are about 15-20 layers of paint/wallpaper in the living room and so many laers of paint on the moldings that all the detail is lost. The bathroom follows suit, with enough layers of wall board that they're flush with the 3/4 inch molding around the door. I'm bucking the trend by taking it down to the original wall, which we'll re-drywall in this room.
So the top layer board is likely the 80's reno: cream pressed tile board w/ little blue flowers. Kinda country/Dutch tile look. This was painted white more recently. Under that is a snazzy beige/gold board that was both on the walls and the ceilings (see second picture). A disco light and some LSD and this bathroom would have been trippin' back in the day. Under that is the original plaster with some interesting colors (lavender bathroom (ceiling, walls AND trim), anyone?) - made more vibrant by the pretty gross mold. It isn't currently damp, but I called over the mold guy to check into it anyway.

Pictures:
One: "As is" when I moved in
Two: From the same vantage point, mid demo
Three: snazzy ceiling
Four: privacy wall from the tub/toilet side.

Things I've learned so far in this house:

• Fiberglass is the "no-seeum" bug of the remodeling world. You can't see it, but it hurts like a bitch.
• You can destroy just about anything with a crowbar and hammer.