Following a major earthquake in 1918, the U.S. Customs Service undertook a comprehensive program of rebuilding and new construction. The remodeling may have been under the supervision of Albert B. Nichols, architect and inspector of buildings under the Supervising Architect of the Treasury's San Juan field office. A sheet of drawings, unsigned and undated, for the remodeling are in the San Juan Custom House files, and the Puerto Rico Historic Preservation Office believes that they may be Nichols' work. Three other sheets signed by Rafael Carmoega, Chief architect of the insular government and presumed to date from August 1930, exist in the Public Building Service records.