hen she looked closely, squinting through the veneer of neglect, Tin Myaing Thein would fall in love with the red brick building and its hidden history. This was a piece of Honolulu's old Chinatown, a graffiti-tagged survivor with secrets from another century.

But even though the three-story structure on King Street was listed on the state's historic registry — it was built about 1886 — Thein's first impressions were anything but adoring.

"I thought it was a dump," she said. "You would just think it was an abandoned building."

Thein's nonprofit group, Pacific Gateway Center, bought it anyway and started an extensive $3 million renovation. Over the five years of work so far, workers have unearthed a collection of artifacts that date back to the 19th century and possibly earlier: pieces of Chinese and European ceramic tableware, cups, plates, jars once used to ship preserved items from China, a few whole whiskey bottles, eight-sided spice bottles, porcelain electrical fixtures and square nails not used since 1895.

World War I-era ordnance was even found under the building; a bomb squad was needed to remove that.

Pacific Gateway hopes to move into the 4,155-square-foot building this October and begin using it as an incubator for low- to moderate-income clients who want to start their own business.

The building was purchased from the owners of Paradise Produce in 2003 for $1.1 million, Thein said. Chinatown properties are among the longest-held in Honolulu, rarely coming up for sale, so the building at 83 N. King St. was immediately attractive, she said.

"You could see it was an old building and it had not been maintained, but it had so much promise," she said. "You could see it had a lot of things in there that really needed to be preserved and renovated and brought back to life."

A wooden stairway slanted frightfully to one side, the beams were being eaten by termites and one of the previous owners had built a mezzanine for an office that even Thein, at 5-foot-2, found cramped.

"Only menehune could work there," she said. "We had to demolish it."

Valerie Park, a Pacific Consulting Services Inc. archaeologist on the site, said the building housed a variety of businesses. The first is believed to be a general store called Yuen Chong Co., which remained in operation until 1964.

Park found the name of the general store by paging through business directories from the era. That's important to know, she said, because merchants of the period helped new immigrants adjust to Hawai'i, often developing close personal relationships with them.

Park wants to learn more about Yuen Chong's role as a social center and networking hub for the Chinese community.

Her goal is to collect as much history as possible.

Historic maps of Honolulu, which were found at the University of Hawai'i's Hamilton Library, indicate that the building was built soon after the huge Chinatown fire of 1886, which leveled much of the area, Park said. The building somehow survived the second great Chinatown fire in 1900 as well.

"I was lucky enough to meet an elderly gentleman who sits on the Pacific Gateway Center's board who grew up in Honolulu and remembers coming to Yuen Chong Co. in his youth to pick up mail from China," she said.

"Because Pacific Gateway Center is planning to develop an exhibit on the history of the building, it would be wonderful if we could find more members of the Chinese community who recall visiting or working at Yuen Chong Co., so that oral history information can be learned and passed along to future generations," Park said.

The excavation also unearthed Hawaiian artifacts with a history that still remains unclear.

"All the artifacts that are coming out from below the building footprint are probably older than 1886," she said.

Among them: a fishing lure, an abrader, which was used to make fish hooks, a broken hammer stone, a pestle and several 'ulumaika stones.

The old maps explained that the area was once home to a village named Kou. It had fields where the stones were used in a popular Hawaiian game, Park said.

More could be uncovered because utility lines still need to be placed six feet below ground, she said.

"We're finding a mixed bag," Park said. "There are some areas where there is undisturbed soil and the artifacts are not mixed up. It is ideal for us to find something intact that hasn't been messed with."

It's all been a joy for Thein, who felt from the very start that the site would yield wonderful things.

With each new discovery, she has found herself more and more fascinated by the building. If she has her way, she'll include a display of the artifacts as a way to tell some of its story once it re-opens. It's a way to breathe life into a once run-down building.

"I am a closet historian," Thein said. "I love the history part of it, so the building became more and more meaningful to me."