Papers more than 100 years old were revealed as the mystery contents inside an old safe recently uncovered in a Tauranga restaurant.
Old insurance and banking papers dating back to 1912 belonged to a Te Puna taxi driver.
The old documents where found inside an old Thomas Skidmore & Son safe embedded in a wall in the main dining area at the Curry Hut in Wharf St.
Curry Hut owner Sunil Kumar was hoping something more exciting would be inside the safe.
"You don't know what is inside. It's always something that could be exciting.
"There's lots of old documents and papers," Mr Kumar said.
The mystery safe was discovered last month after a couple dining in the restaurant noticed it.
He thought the safe, which was painted the same orange as the walls in the restaurant, was an artwork and had not taken any notice of it until the English couple recognised the emblem on the front and insisted it could be as old as a century.
He had discovered the body of the safe in a storage cupboard, under the stairs behind a wall.
After a previous failed attempt by a locksmith to open the safe, it was yesterday cracked by another locksmith Mr Kumar called in.
"I called for [the locksmith] to come and open the safe because I didn't know what to do with it," Mr Kumar said.
Tauranga City information services librarian Debbie McCauley said in 1934 it appeared that the business was Clinkard & Co Seeds and Flowers.
Although the contents of the mystery safe wasn't something Mr Kumar had hoped for, he's determined to reunite the old documents with the relatives of the man they belonged to.
"If they were my forefather whose papers they were, I would want to find out and have them back.
"I just want to give [the papers] to the family." he said