design idea - reclaimed maple flooring

I have no idea what the pile of flooring I picked up last night (see my last post) will end up looking like so I googled "reclaimed maple flooring" and I found the Crossroads Lumber site.  I love what they did with recycled gymnasium basketball court flooring ($3.50@sq. ft.).  Although our floor was not treated as gently during its former life.

And here it is below sanded.  I wish there were a way they could have kept the paint while getting rid of the yellowish finish.  Bummer.  In fact, I sort of wish they had just left it alone.
But still, it ends up looking pretty nice after sanding too - just not as much character.

One thing that seems clear is that we don't need to plane it before installing it.  Sanding will be just fine - although our flooring is a bazillion times more wrecked than this stuff.  Our flooring lived under the watchful eye of a very different sign than the gym flooring enjoyed (ours and theirs, respectively):

What else did I find for recycled maple flooring?
Well, here's a good example of what I expect ours will look like installed - I found this at Longleaf Lumber:

The Longleaf Lumber website warns: "Expect character: nail holes, cart marks, and color variation."

These guys want $5.25@sq. ft. for reclaimed maple factory flooring!! and the stuff in the picture is very like what we got, though not as grimy. (suddenly I feel pretty smart)

And here is a site (BrownDogBuildingSupply) that sells "reclaimed foundry maple" floors:

The shot on the left actually looks worse than ours looks.  Their description says:
"it shows the kind of honorable scars and marks you might expect from a life of service in a cotton mill, aircraft factory or pressing plant".
Thoughts?