When Toby Sweeney knocked open a wall at the Terrace Tavern to replace a backsplash near the beer taps, she wasn’t expecting to embark on an archaeological dig. But behind the drywall sat the original outdoor fireplace from the original Ma Reese’s Bar, dormant for decades, along with fragments of wooden siding where a painted sign had hung once. She and her crew stood there, trying to piece it together like a puzzle with half the pieces missing.

“Where’s the gold?” she joked. “Did anybody bury any?” What they found instead were old receipts and the proof of the…