In 1888, the New Jersey Home for the Education and Care of Feebleminded Children was opened in southern New Jersey (later the Vineland Training School). Among many expansions of the institution, the Menantico Colony was to be used as a state farm to treat "feeble-minded" young men, using rural settings and challenging work to ease the mind. The work also served as occupational therapy in hopes to return the men with skills that would support them outside the institution. In 1913, 530 acres of land were purchased at a bargain price of $10 an acre; the oak scrub landscape contained within was to be transformed into productive farmland.