Better
Over all, the years that followed the move to Hicksville appear to have been much better for the residents than the preceding decades. Their home made the news less often, because no one was threatening to condemn the buildings, or calling them unsuitable, or calling the Institute wasteful, or predicting that it would go bankrupt.
In September 1926, the annual report on County institutions found that the Jones Institute was well managed, as was its hospital. The report also noted that for the date of the visit (probably in August or very early September) the home once again had 38 residents, more than was customary for the season. Perhaps this meant that farmers had hired fewer hands than usual that summer - if that was so, it might be a symptom of the incursion of more housing plots into traditional farmland.
Judging by the January 6, 1928 issue of the weekly Long-Islander, the people of Hicksville had embraced the Jones Institute. The paper's Hicksville column included a letter of thanks from the residents. It expressed warm appreciation for the Christmas visit of the Walter Wheeler Council of the Junior Order of United American Mechanics (a fraternal order of - don't be misled by its name - adults; the local Council was named after one of Hicksville's WW I dead). The group had brought gifts to the residents, as well as providing "excellent Yuletide entertainment."
The same column noted that on the following Sunday, the local Epworth League (an organization for young Methodists) was going to arrive at the home with a busload of people, to conduct a "song service."
All in all, newspaper coverage during these years suggests that life in the new Institute was far less gloomy than life in the old.
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In 1940, an inmate passed away. He had arrived at the home in 1933, which for much of America was the extreme height (or depth) of the Great Depression. Like all the residents, before arriving, he had been found to be indigent, based upon all the information that was known about him.
Early in 1941, his will was probated, at which point it became known that he had maintained an undisclosed bank account with a balance of about $8,000. Thus, in violation of the home's rules, he had never been legally indigent. The lawyers of the "Two Towns and a City" took his estate to court, intending to recover the costs of having maintained and housed him for seven years.
Spoiler Alert: I have not been able to determine how things were resolved.
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