When reconstructing the floors, the restoration carpenters needed the new floorboards to look exactly as they did in ca. 1764. Because other examples of ca. 1764 floors in the Mansion featured "gauging and undercutting" marks on the bottom of the boards, the restoration carpenters would also have to recreate these marks. Gauging and undercutting was commonly used by colonial carpenters to lay flat, almost perfectly flush floors on the roughly sawn, uneven boards that they had available.