Illinois’ oldest veterans’ home has a new look, nearly $300 million worth, and officials say it’s meant to put a dark chapter from 2015 firmly in the past. Gov. JB Pritzker joined local, state and community leaders on October 20, 2025, in Quincy to celebrate the grand opening of new long-term-care and independent-living buildings at the Illinois Veterans’ Home at Quincy, a campus that has served former service members since 1886.
A Nearly $300 Million Rebuild
The project was described as a nearly $300 million investment funded through the state’s Rebuild Illinois capital program, according to a release from Gov. Pritzker’s office. It includes a 260,000-square-foot long-term-care facility and an 80,000-square-foot independent-living residence, with the long-term-care building offering private rooms and bathrooms for 210 residents. Altogether, the home now has the capacity to support 467 residents and currently employs 417 staff, per the same release.
As WGN-TV reports, the Quincy campus spans 210 acres and contains more than 20 buildings, connected by five miles of roads and two bridges, with an on-site lake shaped like the state of Illinois. The home serves hundreds of former U.S. military service members from its location roughly 300 miles from Chicago, and it primarily cares for Vietnam War veterans, along with a few World War II veterans and some Korean War veterans, according to the station’s reporting.
Confronting a 2015 Outbreak
The new buildings arrive a decade after a 2015 Legionnaires’ disease outbreak at the Quincy home drew intense scrutiny. Accounts of the outbreak’s toll differ: St. Louis Public Radio reported the outbreak was linked to the deaths of 14 residents and illnesses among dozens more, while the Quincy Herald-Whig reported it was responsible for the deaths of at least 12 residents and more than 50 illnesses.
The station’s report notes the new facility now includes updated plumbing, water-treatment systems and high-tech equipment that scans for bacteria. The rebuilding effort also involved demolishing seven aging structures. The Neilson Dining Facility underwent a full renovation.
New Residents, New Buildings
The independent-living residence welcomed its first residents in January 2025, and residents began moving into the long-term-care building the month before the October opening, per the same account from St. Louis Public Radio. Figures on the independent-living space also vary between sources: the governor’s office described 88 private studio and one-bedroom apartments with accommodations large enough for resident spouses and children, while Muddy River News described the broader $300 million project as including 80 independent-living rooms alongside a 210-bed skilled-care center. WGN-TV, for its part, reports the home offers independent living for about 100 veterans in studio and one-bedroom apartments, plus memory care and accommodations for married veterans.
WGN-TV also reports the home has organized its long-term-care residents into smaller residential units of 15 members each, aiming to deliver restorative therapy close to where residents live. The campus includes a theater and a chapel, and daily programming integrates brain games and social happy hours, according to the station.
Veterans Call It Home
For residents like Robert Whitton, the renovated campus is more than new construction. Whitton graduated high school in 1974 and joined the Marine Corps afterward, later serving as military police; he told WGN-TV he enlisted because friends had died in Vietnam and he served during the Vietnam era. Whitton, who now resides at the Quincy home, described the facility as marvelous and called it the “Taj Mahal of Quincy, Illinois,” the station reported. He said his family is gone, but he considers the veterans’ home his home and an extended family.
Staff who have spent years on the campus echoed that sense of purpose. Amanda Bunch, who began her career at the home as a CNA and now serves as the home’s adjutant, told WGN-TV that local services and amenities meet veterans’ needs without requiring them to go outside the campus.
Leadership and a Statewide Mission
The Illinois Veterans’ Home at Quincy was founded in 1886 as the Soldier and Sailor’s Home, according to the governor’s release, and WGN-TV reports it was originally called the Soldiers and Sailors Home, established under Gov. Richard Oglesby for disabled veterans of the Mexican and Civil wars. It remains the oldest and largest of the five veterans’ homes the state owns and operates, per the station’s reporting.
Terry Prince, a 31-year Navy veteran whom Gov. Pritzker appointed director of the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs in April 2021, leads a department of 1,300 professionals that assists more than 550,000 veterans and their families statewide, according to WGN-TV. Prince told the station the job allows him to change veterans’ lives and connect them with resources, and he said veterans experienced changed public reactions after Vietnam, with mental health needs expanding in the years that followed.
