Found a faint ring of friction material, only about 0.1mm wide, adhered around the inner circumference of both sides of all the steel plates. It could be seen but not felt with a fingertip, spudger or fingernail. Vapor blasting removed it fairly quickly, leaving the steels with a nice, clean semigloss finish. Strangely, no friction material was apparent on the aluminum surface of the clutch hub facing the last friction plate. The difficulty removing that fiber plate from the hub must have been simply the oil's surface tension holding them together. Two right angle probes got it to release.
Scrubbed the fiber plates with scotchbrite-type pads in the parts washer to knock any glaze off, dried overnight then soaked them in clean motor oil for a few days. After assembly, no sticking was apparent after a few days. That wouldn't have been the case prior to cleaning all the plates.
The answer we came up with for reducing/eliminating the tendency for the clutch pack to stick during long-term storage is really fairly simple: Remove the adjuster screw/locknut from the steel worm gear under the teardrop cover, and replace it with any random 8 x 1.25 bolt of sufficient length. Finger tighten the bolt until firm contact with the pushrod, then use a wrench to further tighten only one turn. On the freshly-rebuilt clutch, that one turn relived clutch plate pressure enough that the fiber plates would spin free, leaving the steel plates & clutch basket stationary even when the tranny is in neutral. Not quite as convenient as tying the clutch handle back, but won't stress the cable under tension for long periods. We'll store the adjuster screw/locknut in the battery box, which will be empty anyway for long storage.
Good Ridin'
slmjim & Z1BEBE