gggrrr... seems I was referring to the wrong instructions. I thought I remembered more sacred dirs than just styles. When I did the upgrade, I made a full zip of all of the UBB files, and also a separate zip of just the styles directory. I copied all of the files that came with 7.5.4.1, then unzipped the styles backup so that our previous files "would win".
I have restored the includes and cache_builders/custom directories, then I restored the .php files that were in cache_builders.
We are seeing the headers for our islands, but the islands have no content within them.
Getting closer... suggestions from here? Thanks!