Thanks for the suggestions.
To make a long story short:
Permission errors started showing up in nested folders in users folders besides the web server. (It was an oh shit moment!) I checked error logs and saw some other permissions issues and decided to rsync my data files to a usb drive. Then I shutdown the server, removed the 10.1 installation disks, replaced with the 9.2 disks, and booted 9.2 back up.
Configured the workstations to again use smb1 and disable 2/3 protocols and then rsync'd my data files back to the 9.2 installation.
Back up and running with 9.2. and everything is as it should be.
Since my 9.2 has never shown any permissions issues or errors in any logs, my best guess is that a version 9 contrib or a custom template was f'ing things up. I'll dig into this more in a month or so. For now, everyone is back in business at work.