Ohhh.

Can you talk to the previous owner(s), and find out what they had in mind or used?

There might be something that they can tell you, maybe all speakers are not fed from the TV?

If all speakers are fed from the TV, then you could use a receiver (that the TV runs through), so you can have the TV or other equipment piped in those areas where the other speakers are installed.
You could have a speaker selection box with volume controls for each set of speakers, to control the volume in all areas in conjunction with the receiver.

This is all a guess, there are many variables that are possible for the information given.

Tried to find the owners with no luck but did find the company who installed them. And all they remember is what I outlined in post. Speakers near Tv are fed from TV area. Other speakers in BR and Kitchen/Dining areas are fed from office.

There are volume controls for living room bedroom and Kitchen/Dining area in each respective area.

I know this is confusing and I'm probably not explaining it very well.

Your receiver may be shutting down because you have a short in the wires that feed your speakers. Or in the V/C's. Check to make sure that no copper strands of wire are touching the wrong connectors.

ie: a strand of the + side of the wire is touching the - side of the wire.

I'm not a tech or an audiophile, just a homeowner who has been hooking up and installing stereo equipment for lots of years. First, it would be nice to see how the speakers sound. If you can get your receiver to work long enough, you could connect the receiver's speaker outputs to the inputs in your office, one set at a time, and see if you like the way the speakers sound in the respective rooms, how the volume controls work, etc. If I understand you, there are two sets of inputs in your office. Most standard stereo receivers (not necessarily AV receivers) will allow you to hook up two sets of speakers and switch them on and off independently. Or maybe you could borrow a receiver to test. I don't think I'd put much money into fixing the old receiver, as much as you may love it. I went that route, and decided to buy a more modern, inexpensive Aiwa receiver. It's fine for my purposes and even has a remote control, which you don't get with the older ones (will only work in the same room however). If you need to hook up more than two sets of speakers, then you will need a more sophisticated solution. But it's great that you've got speakers and wiring installed. Just some thoughts.

Another thought, depending on how and where the wires are run, would be to have the wires rerun to all go to a central location, such as by the TV area. For example, I have a 5.1 set up in my living room/theatre area, and add'l speakers for the dining room and BR as well as outside. My house is one story, so all the wires run through the attic space, and I dont know if this is an option for you.
All of the speaker wires terminate in the theater room. We have a receiver/amp powering the 5.1 setup, and on the "2nd room" portion of this amp, which is unpowered, feeds to a separate receiver which only powers all of the other rooms' speakers. You can get a reciever with a powered 2nd room output, though I forget why we went this route.
This way we can either have the whole house playing from the same component, or the theatre running the TV audio and the rest of the house running a CD (or Ipod).