Knocking out the Shower Walls

I spent the better part of a day knocking down the walls around the tub. With two very different types of materials to destroy, I had to learn two different techniques. For the greenboard around the lower half of the walls, I could pry up the board in large chunks, and tear it off with my hands (well, that is, the board that didn't crumble off from the rot). The top half of the removed wall was original lathe and plaster--that's also why you can see dots of plaster leaking through in the exposed spaces. For those upper sections, I had to just smash it with the pry bar and hope for the best. It wasn't dusty at all, but I ended up cleaning out a full tub of debris three times over.

I also had to remove tons of rusty nails and a handful of green and yellow painted shims (you can see one right where I'm removing the wall in the top pic). I think someone tested their paint colors on leftover wood, and then stuck the wood in the walls. It made me start thinking about leaving behind something in the wall for the next person who opens it up.

I stopped removing wall at the seams that were high enough to accommodate the tile surround. I've read conflicting advice on whether to take out the wall all the way up or just as much as you need to cover with tile, and I figure when in doubt, destroy less.