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The Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ, originally Peoples Temple Full Gospel Church and commonly shortened to Peoples Temple, was an American new religious organization which existed between 1954 and 1978. Founded in
Before he founded his church, Jim Jones had become enamored with
"Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 134."
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. This, among other things, provided a clerical inspiration for Jones; as he himself described it in a biographical recording: Although Jones feared that he would end up being the victim of a backlash for being a communist, he was surprised when a
Indianapolis
Indianapolis (), colloquially known as Indy, is the state capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the seat of Marion County. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the consolidated population of Indianapolis and Marion ...
, Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th ...
by Reverend Jim Jones, the Peoples Temple spread a message that combined elements of Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global popula ...
with communist
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...
and socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
ideology, with an emphasis on racial equality. After Jones moved the group to California
California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
in the 1960s and established several locations throughout the state, including its headquarters
Headquarters (commonly referred to as HQ) denotes the location where most, if not all, of the important functions of an organization are coordinated. In the United States, the corporate headquarters represents the entity at the center or the to ...
in San Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...
, the Temple forged ties with many left-wing
Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
political figures and claimed to have 20,000 members (though 3,000–5,000 is more likely).
The Temple is best known for the events of November 18, 1978, in Guyana
Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...
, when 909 people died in a mass suicide and mass murder
Mass murder is the act of murdering a number of people, typically simultaneously or over a relatively short period of time and in close geographic proximity. The United States Congress defines mass killings as the killings of three or more pe ...
at its remote settlement, named " Jonestown", as well as the murders of U.S. Congressman Leo Ryan
Leo Joseph Ryan Jr. (May 5, 1925 – November 18, 1978) was an American teacher and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. representative from California's 11th congressional district from 1973 until his assassinati ...
and members of his visiting delegation at the nearby Port Kaituma
Port Kaituma is a small village within the Barima-Waini administrative region of Guyana. It became known internationally as a gateway village to the Peoples Temple settlement in nearby Jonestown. It has long been a hub for mining in the area.
...
airstrip. The incident at Jonestown resulted in the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a deliberate act prior to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001
The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commerc ...
. Because of the killings in Guyana, the Temple is regarded by scholars and by popular view as a destructive cult.
Before California
Indiana formation
Before he founded his church, Jim Jones had become enamored with communism
Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, ...
and he was also frustrated by the harassment which communists were being subjected to in the U.S. during the Red Scare
A Red Scare is the promotion of a widespread fear of a potential rise of communism, anarchism or other leftist ideologies by a society or state. The term is most often used to refer to two periods in the history of the United States which ar ...
.Jones, Jim"Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 134."
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. This, among other things, provided a clerical inspiration for Jones; as he himself described it in a biographical recording: Although Jones feared that he would end up being the victim of a backlash for being a communist, he was surprised when a
Methodist
Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's ...
superintendent (whom he had not met through the American Communist Party) helped him enter the church, despite his knowledge that Jones was a communist.Horrock, Nicholas M., "Communist in 1950s", ''New York Times'', December 17, 1978 In 1952, Jones became a student pastor in Sommerset Southside Methodist Church in Indianapolis
Indianapolis (), colloquially known as Indy, is the state capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the seat of Marion County. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the consolidated population of Indianapolis and Marion ...
, Indiana
Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th ...
, but left that church because it barred him from integrating African-Americans into his congregation. In 1954, Jones founded his own church in a rented space in Indianapolis, at first, he named it the Community Unity Church.
Jones had previously observed a faith healing
Faith healing is the practice of prayer and gestures (such as laying on of hands) that are believed by some to elicit divine intervention in spiritual and physical healing, especially the Christian practice. Believers assert that the healin ...
service at the Seventh Day Baptist Church, which led him to conclude that such healings could attract people, and generate income, which he could use to accomplish his social goals.Wessinger, Catherine. ''How the Millennium Comes Violently: From Jonestown to Heaven's Gate''. Seven Bridges Press, 2000. . Jones and the Temple's members knowingly faked healings because they found that the healings increased people's faith and generated financial resources which they could use to help the poor and finance the church. These "healings" involved the use of chicken livers and other animal tissue, which Jones (and confederate Temple members) claimed were cancer
Cancer is a group of diseases involving abnormal cell growth with the potential to invade or spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Possible signs and symptoms include a lump, abnormal b ...
ous tissues which had been removed from the bodies of the people who had been healed.
In 1955, Jones bought his first church building, located in a racially mixed Indianapolis neighborhood. He first named his church Wings of Deliverance,Reiterman 1982. pp. 49–52. and later that year, he renamed it the Peoples Temple Full Gospel Church, the first time he used the phrase "Peoples Temple." Jones's healings and purported clairvoyant revelations attracted spiritualist
Spiritualism is the metaphysical school of thought opposing physicalism and also is the category of all spiritual beliefs/views (in monism and dualism) from ancient to modern. In the long nineteenth century, Spiritualism (when not lowercase) ...
s.
Latter Rain Movement
Jones began closely associating with the Independent Assemblies of God (IAoG), an international group of churches who embraced the Latter Rain movement. The IAoG had few requirements for ordaining ministers and were accepting of divine healing practices. In June 1955, Jones held his first joint meetings withWilliam Branham
William Marrion Branham (April 6, 1909 – December 24, 1965) was an American Christian minister and faith healer who initiated the post-World War II healing revival, and claimed to be a prophet with the anointing of Elijah, who had come t ...
, a healing evangelist
Evangelist may refer to:
Religion
* Four Evangelists, the authors of the canonical Christian Gospels
* Evangelism, publicly preaching the Gospel with the intention of spreading the teachings of Jesus Christ
* Evangelist (Anglican Church), a co ...
and Pentecostal
Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestantism, Protestant Charismatic Christianity, Charismatic Christian movementHealing Revival.
In 1956, Jones was
"Inside Peoples Temple."
''New West Magazine''. August 1, 1977 (hosted at Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University). It established permanent facilities in those cities in 1971 and 1972, respectively.Reiterman 1982. p. 164. In San Francisco, the Temple occupied a former Scottish Rite temple at 1859 Geary Boulevard; in Los Angeles, the Temple occupied the former building of the First Church of Christ, Scientist at 1366 S. Alvarado Street.
By 1972, the Temple called Redwood Valley the "mother church" of a "statewide political movement". From the start, the Los Angeles facility's primary purposes were to recruit members and to serve as a waystation for the Temple's weekly bus trips across California. The Temple set up permanent staff in Los Angeles and arranged bus trips there every other week. The substantial attendance and collections in Los Angeles helped support the Temple's inflated membership claims. The Los Angeles facility was larger than San Francisco's. Its central location at the corner of Alvarado and Hoover Streets permitted easy geographic access for a large black membership from
"Jones disciple recovers from, recalls painful past."
''Seattle Post-Intelligencer''. November 19, 2003. Membership quickly ballooned from 50 to over 100. During the week, members convened for meetings in various Redwood Valley locations, sometimes until dawn. The Planning Commission was responsible for the Temple's day-to-day operations, including key decision-making, financial and legal planning, and oversight. The Commission sat over various other committees, such as the Diversions Committee, which carried out tasks such as writing huge numbers of letters to politicians from fictional people mailed from various locations around the U.S., and the Mertles Committee, which undertook activities against defectors Al and Jeannie Mills.Hall 1987, pp. 178–184 A group of rank-and-file members, whom outsiders called the "troops", consisted of working-class members who were 70–80% black. They set up chairs for meetings, filled offering boxes, and did other tasks. Many of them were attracted to the Temple's quasi-socialist approach both because of the Temple's political education offers and because the Temple's highly passionate congregations still maintained the familiar forms of evangelical prayers and black gospels. Jones also surrounded himself with several dozen mostly white, privileged members in their twenties and thirties who had skills in law, accounting, nursing, teaching, music, and administration. This latter group carried out public relations, financial duties, and more mundane chores while bringing in good salaries from well-paying outside jobs.
Time Magazine, December 11, 1978
The move to San Francisco permitted Jones to be more open with his true political and theological leanings. p. 161 By spring 1976, Jones openly admitted even to outsiders that he was an atheist. Despite the Temple's fear that the
"Madman in Our Midst: Jim Jones and the California Cover Up."
1998. Steven Alan Hassan's Freedom of Mind Center. Retrieved October 14, 2010.
PBS.org. Jones and the Temple received the support of California political figures such as Moscone, Governor
"Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 799."
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. Jones used his position at the Housing Authority to lead the fight against the eviction of tenants from San Francisco's International Hotel.Reiterman 1982. pp. 282–283. The Temple further forged an alliance with San Francisco's Black community newspaper, the ''Sun Reporter'' publisher Dr. Carlton Goodlett and it received frequent favorable mentions in that paper.Reiterman 1982. p. 265. It also received frequent favorable coverage from ''
However, the Temple aroused police suspicion after Jones praised the Symbionese Liberation Army, a radical
''Letter Addressed to President Jimmy Carter, Dated February 19, 1978''
Alternatives Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple, San Diego State University Jones saw Jonestown as both a "socialist paradise" and a "sanctuary" from media scrutiny that had started with the Kinsolving articles. Former Temple member Tim Carter said the Temple moved to Jonestown because "in '74, what we saw in the United States was creeping fascism."Tim Carter
''There was no choice in Jonestown that day...''
Oregon Public Broadcasting Radio interview. April 9, 2007. Carter explained, "It was apparent that corporations, or the multinationals, were getting much larger, their influence was growing within the government, and the United States is a racist place." He said the Temple concluded that Guyana was "a place in a black country where our black members could live in peace", "it was a socialist government" and it was "the only English-speaking country in South America." Increasing media scrutiny based on allegations by former members placed further pressure on Jones, especially after a 1977 article by Marshall Kilduff in ''
''
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University. In all, 918 people died, including 276 children. This includes four that died at the Temple headquarters that night in the Guyanese capital of Georgetown. Some members resisted committing "revolutionary suicide," and were injected with fatal doses of cyanide, as were infants, and others survived by fleeing through the jungle. It was the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a deliberate act until the events of September 11, 2001.Knapp, Don
"Jonestown massacre + 20: Questions linger."
CNN.com. November 18, 1998. Retrieved April 9, 2007.
File:PTinGuyana Cen image001.gif, Jonestown arrivals and population
File:Jonestown entrance.jpg, The entrance to Jonestown
File:Jonestown Houses.jpg, Housing in Jonestown
File:Leo Ryan.jpg, Congressman
The Temple's San Francisco headquarters was besieged by the national media and the relatives of the Jonestown victims.Reiterman 1982. p. 573 The mass killing became one of the best-known events in U.S. history as measured by the Gallup poll and appeared on the cover of several newspapers and magazines, including ''
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. killed himself in March 1979, four months after the Jonestown incident. In the days leading up to his death, Prokes sent notes to several people, together with a thirty-page statement he had written about the Temple. Caen reprinted one copy in his ''Chronicle'' column. Prokes then arranged for a press conference in a
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University: Jonestown Project. Retrieved September 22, 2007. Before the tragedy, Temple member Paula Adams engaged in a romantic relationship with Guyana's Ambassador to the United States, Laurence "Bonny" Mann. Adams later married Mann.Weingarten, Gene
''The Washington Post''. January 22, 2006. On October 24, 1983, Mann fatally shot both Adams and the couple's child, and then fatally shot himself. Defecting member Harold Cordell lost twenty family members on the evening of the poisonings. The Bogues family, which had also defected, lost its daughter Marilee (age 18), while defector Vernon Gosney lost his son Mark (age 5). The mass suicide of the Peoples Temple has helped embed the idea that all
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University: Jonestown Project. 2007-03-08. In light of lawsuits, on December 4, 1978,''Central Spanish Seventh-day Adventist Church''
AdventistChurchConnect.org. The Temple's former San Francisco headquarters, located at 1859 Geary Boulevard, was destroyed in the
San Diego State University: Extensive site with source documents, list of dead, pictures
Audio Recording of Jonestown Suicide
* Isaacson, Barry
From Silver Lake to Suicide: One Family's Secret History of the Jonestown Massacre
605 Adults 304 Children
a 2019 short documentary filmed entirely by The Peoples Temple at Jonestown {{Authority control 1955 establishments in California Apocalyptic groups Cults African-American history in San Francisco Christian new religious movements History of the San Francisco Bay Area Post–civil rights era in African-American history Religion in the San Francisco Bay Area Religious organizations disestablished in 1978 Religious organizations established in 1955 Religious belief systems founded in the United States 1954 establishments in Indiana Anti-Americanism Far-left politics in the United States
ordained
Ordination is the process by which individuals are consecrated, that is, set apart and elevated from the laity class to the clergy, who are thus then authorized (usually by the denominational hierarchy composed of other clergy) to perform ...
as an IAoG minister by Joseph Mattsson-Boze, a leader in the Latter Rain movement and the IAoG. Jones quickly rose to prominence in the group. Working with the IAoG, Jones organized and hosted a healing convention to take place June 11–15, 1956, in Indianapolis's Cadle Tabernacle. Needing a well-known figure to draw crowds, he arranged to share the pulpit again with Reverend Branham.
Branham was known to tell supplicants their name, address, and why they came for prayer, before pronouncing them healed. Jones was intrigued by Branham's methods and began performing the same feats. Jones and Branham's meetings were very successful and attracted an audience of 11,000 at their first joint campaign. At the convention, Branham issued a prophetic endorsement of Jones and his ministry, saying that God used the convention to send forth a new great ministry.
Many attendees in the campaign believed Jones's performance indicated that he possessed a supernatural gift, and coupled with Branham's endorsement, it led to rapid growth of Peoples Temple. Jones was particularly effective at recruitment among the African American attendees at the conventions. According to a newspaper report, regular attendance at Peoples Temple swelled to 1,000 thanks to the publicity Branham provided to Jones and Peoples Temple.
Following the convention, Jones renamed his church the "Peoples Temple Christian Church Full Gospel" to associate it with Full Gospel The term Full Gospel or Fourfold Gospel is a theological doctrine used by some evangelical denominations that summarizes the Gospel in four aspects, namely salvation, sanctification, divine healing and second coming of Christ.
Doctrine
This term ...
Pentecostalism; the name was later shortened to the Peoples Temple. Jones participated in a series of multi-state revival campaigns with Branham and Mattsson-Boze in the second half of the 1950s, making multiple joint appearances with them. Jones claimed to be a follower and promoter of Branham's "Message" during the period. Peoples Temple hosted a second international Pentecostal convention in 1957 which was again headlined by Branham. Through the conventions and with the support of Branham and Mattsson-Boze, Jones secured connections throughout the Latter Rain movement.
Indianapolis expansion
Jones used the convention meetings with other Pentecostal speakers to gain wide publicity, and Jones continued to disguise the fact that he was using religion to further his political ideology. Those conventions drew as many as 11,000 attendees, as Jones and the other preachers conducted "healings" and impressed attendees by revealing private information—usually addresses, phone numbers, orSocial Security number
In the United States, a Social Security number (SSN) is a nine-digit number issued to U.S. citizens, permanent residents, and temporary (working) residents under section 205(c)(2) of the Social Security Act, codified as . The number is issued to ...
s, which private detectives could easily discover beforehand. Jones and Temple members also drove through various cities in Indiana and Ohio
Ohio () is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. Of the List of states and territories of the United States, fifty U.S. states, it is the List of U.S. states and territories by area, 34th-l ...
on recruiting and fundraising efforts.Reiterman 1982. p. 57.
The Temple stressed egalitarian ideals, asking members to attend in casual clothes so poor members would not feel out of place, and providing shelter for the needy.Reiterman 1982. pp. 54–55. While the Temple had increased its African-American membership from 15% to nearly 50%, in order to attempt further gains the Temple hired African-American preacher Archie Ijames (who had earlier given up organized religion). Pastor Ijames was one of the first to commit to Jones's socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the ...
collective
A collective is a group of entities that share or are motivated by at least one common issue or interest, or work together to achieve a common objective. Collectives can differ from cooperatives in that they are not necessarily focused upon an ...
program. In 1959, the church joined the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), and was renamed the Peoples Temple Christian Church Full Gospel. This affiliation was a successful attempt to both raise the dwindling membership and restore the reputation of the organization.
In February 1960, the Temple opened a soup kitchen
A soup kitchen, food kitchen, or meal center, is a place where food is offered to the hungry usually for free or sometimes at a below-market price (such as via coin donations upon visiting). Frequently located in lower-income neighborhoods, soup ...
for the poor and expanded their social services to include rent assistance, job placement services, free canned goods, clothing, and coal for winter heating. Jones and his wife Marceline helped to increase the Temple's soup kitchen service to an average of about 2,800 meals per month. The Temple's public profile was further elevated when Jones was appointed to the Indianapolis Human Rights Commission. He engaged in public attempts to integrate businesses and was the subject of much local media coverage.
Changes and "religious communalism"
Jones had read extensively about Father Divine, the founder of the International Peace Mission movement.Reiterman 1982. p. 59. Jones and members of the Temple visited Divine several times, while Jones studied his writings and tape recordings of his sermons.Reiterman 1982. pp. 59, 65. The Temple printed Divine's texts for its members and began to preach that members should abstain from sex and only adopt children. In 1959, Jones tested the new fiery rhetorical style that Divine had used in a sermon.Reiterman 1982. p. 60. His speech captivated members with lulls and crescendos, as Jones challenged individual members in front of the group. The speech also marked the beginning of the Temple's underlying "us versus them" message. Jones carefully wove in that the Temple's home for senior citizens was established on the basis " From each according to his ability, to each according to his need", quotingKarl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
's ''Critique of the Gotha Program
The ''Critique of the Gotha Programme'' (german: Kritik des Gothaer Programms) is a document based on a letter by Karl Marx written in early May 1875 to the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Germany (SDAP), with whom Marx and Friedrich Engels wer ...
''.Reiterman 1982. p. 61. He did so knowing that his Christian audience would recognize the similarities with text from the Acts of the Apostles
The Acts of the Apostles ( grc-koi, Πράξεις Ἀποστόλων, ''Práxeis Apostólōn''; la, Actūs Apostolōrum) is the fifth book of the New Testament; it tells of the founding of the Christian Church and the spread of its messag ...
(4:34–35) which stated: "distribution was made to each as any had need." Jones would repeatedly cite that passage to paint Jesus
Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and relig ...
as a communist, while at the same time attacking much of the text of the Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus ...
.
The Temple began tightening control over its organization, asking more of its members than did other churches. It required that members spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with its Temple "family" rather than with blood relatives, the beginning of a process to wean members from outside contact and redirect their lives toward a total commitment to the Temple and its goals. Jones began to offer a deal towards a socialist collective, which he called " religious communalism", in which members would donate their material possessions to the Temple in exchange for the Temple meeting all those members' needs. Pastor Ijames was one of the first to commit.
The Temple had little luck converting most Midwest
The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four Census Bureau Region, census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of ...
erners to communist ideals, even when disguised as religion.Reiterman 1982. p. 62. Admiring the 1959 Cuban Revolution
The Cuban Revolution ( es, Revolución Cubana) was carried out after the 1952 Cuban coup d'état which placed Fulgencio Batista as head of state and the failed mass strike in opposition that followed. After failing to contest Batista in co ...
, Jones traveled to the island nation in 1960 in an unsuccessful attempt to persuade poor black Cubans to move to his congregation in Indiana. The Temple's religious message transitioned during this period, to one treading between atheism
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no d ...
and the subtle notion that Jones was a Christ-like figure.Reiterman 1982. p. 74. While Temple aides complained privately, Jones said that the new message was needed to foster members' dedication to the Temple's larger goals. He maintained such implications until the mid-to-late 1970s.
In 1961, Jones claimed he had had a vision in which Indianapolis and Chicago
(''City in a Garden''); I Will
, image_map =
, map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago
, coordinates =
, coordinates_footnotes =
, subdivision_type = List of sovereign states, Count ...
were destroyed in a nuclear attack
Nuclear warfare, also known as atomic warfare, is a theoretical military conflict or prepared political strategy that deploys nuclear weaponry. Nuclear weapons are weapons of mass destruction; in contrast to conventional warfare, nuclear ...
,Reiterman 1982. p. 76. convincing aides that the Temple needed to look for a new location. A 1962 ''Esquire
Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title.
In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentlema ...
'' magazine article listed the nine safest places to be in a nuclear war, with Belo Horizonte
Belo Horizonte (, ; ) is the sixth-largest city in Brazil, with a population around 2.7 million and with a metropolitan area of 6 million people. It is the 13th-largest city in South America and the 18th-largest in the Americas. The metropol ...
, Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
, topping the list because of its location and atmospheric conditions.Reiterman 1982. p. 77. Jones traveled through Brazil from 1962 through early 1963.Reiterman 1982. p. 83. He requested money from the Temple while in Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
, but the Temple lacked adequate funds for such a request because of shrinking finances in Jones's absence. Jones sent a preacher that had become a follower in Brazil back to Indiana to help stabilize the Temple.Reiterman 1982. p. 85. Jones returned to Indiana in 1963.
In California
Moving Peoples Temple
Jones returned from Brazil in December 1963 to find Peoples Temple bitterly divided. Financial issues and a much smaller congregation forced Jones to sell the Peoples Temple church building and relocate to a smaller building nearby. To raise money, Jones briefly returned to the revival circuit, traveling and holding healing campaigns. After dealing with the issues at Peoples Temple, and possibly in part to distract from them, he told his Indiana congregation that the world would be engulfed by nuclear war on July 15, 1967, leading to a new socialist Eden on Earth, and that the Temple must move toNorthern California
Northern California (colloquially known as NorCal) is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. Spanning the state's northernmost 48 counties, its main population centers incl ...
for safety.
With Jones's return, the majority of his congregation gradually returned to Peoples Temple, improving their financial situation.Lindsey, Robert. November 26, 2005. "Jim Jones-From Poverty to Power of Life and Death." ''New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
''. pp. 1, 20. During 1964 Jones made multiple trips to California to locate a suitable location to relocate. In July 1965, Jones and his followers began moving to their new location in Redwood Valley, California, near the city of Ukiah. Jones's assistant pastor, Russell Winberg, strongly resisted Jones's efforts to move the congregation and warned members of Peoples Temple that Jones was abandoning Christianity.
Winberg took over leadership of the Indianapolis church when Jones departed. About 140 of Jones's most loyal followers made the move to California, while the rest remained behind with Winberg.
In California, Jones was able to use his education degree from Butler University to secure a job as a history and government teacher at an adult education school in Ukiah. Jones used his position to recruit for Peoples Temple, teaching his students the benefits of Marxism and lecturing on religion. Jones planted loyal members of Peoples Temple in the classes to help him with recruitment. His efforts were successful, and Jones recruited 50 new members to Peoples Temple in the first few months. In 1967, Jones's followers coaxed another 75 members of the Indianapolis congregation to move to California.
In 1968, the Peoples Temple's California location was admitted to the Disciples of Christ. Jones began to use the denominational connection to promote Peoples Temple as part of the 1.5 million member denomination. He played up famous members of the Disciples, including Lyndon Johnson
Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...
and J. Edgar Hoover
John Edgar Hoover (January 1, 1895 – May 2, 1972) was an American law enforcement administrator who served as the first Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was appointed director of the Bureau of Investigation ...
, and misrepresented the nature of his position in the denomination. By 1969, Jones increased the membership in Peoples Temple in California to 300.
Apostolic Socialism
Jones developed a theology that was significantly influenced by the teachings of the Latter Rain movement, William Branham, Father Divine, and infused with Jones's personal communist worldview. Jones referred to his belief as " Apostolic Socialism". Following the relocation of Peoples Temple to California, Jones began to gradually introduce the concepts to his followers. According to religious studies professorCatherine Wessinger
Catherine Wessinger () is an American religion scholar. She is the Rev. H. James Yamauchi, S.J. Professor of the History of Religions at Loyola University New Orleans where she teaches religious studies with a main research focus on millennialism ...
, Jones always spoke of the Social Gospel
The Social Gospel is a social movement within Protestantism that aims to apply Christian ethics to social problems, especially issues of social justice such as economic inequality, poverty, alcoholism, crime, racial tensions, slums, unclean envir ...
's virtues, but chose to conceal that his gospel was actually communism until he began to do so in sermons at the Temple in the late 1960s.
Jones taught that "those who remained drugged with the opiate of religion had to be brought to enlightenment", which he defined as socialism. Jones asserted that traditional Christianity had an incorrect view of God. By the early 1970s, Jones began deriding traditional Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global popula ...
as "fly away religion", rejecting the Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity
Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus ...
as being a tool to oppress women and non-whites. Jones referred to traditional Christianity's view of God as a "Sky God
The sky often has important religious significance. Many religions, both polytheistic and monotheistic, have deities associated with the sky.
The daytime sky deities are typically distinct from the nighttime ones. Stith Thompson's '' Moti ...
" who was "no God at all". Instead, Jones claimed to be following the true God who created all things.
Jones taught that ultimate reality was called the "Divine Principle", and this principle was the true God. Jones equated the principle with love, and he equated love with socialism. Jones asserted he was a savior sent by the true God, to rescue humanity from their sufferings. Jones insisted that accepting the "Divine Principle" was equivalent to being " crucified with Christ".
Jones increasingly promoted the idea of his own divinity, going so far as to tell his congregation that "I am come as God Socialist." Jones carefully avoided claiming divinity outside of Peoples Temple, but he expected to be acknowledged as god-like among his followers. Former Temple member Hue Fortson Jr. quoted him as saying:
What you need to believe in is what you can see.... If you see me as your friend, I'll be your friend. As you see me as your father, I'll be your father, for those of you that don't have a father.... If you see me as your savior, I'll be your savior. If you see me as your God, I'll be your God.Further attacking traditional Christianity, Jones authored and circulated a tract entitled "The Letter Killeth", criticizing the
King James Bible
The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611, by sponsorship of ...
, and dismissing King James as a slave owner and a capitalist
Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price system, private ...
who was responsible for the corrupt translation of scripture. Jones claimed he was sent to share the true meaning of the gospel which had been hidden by corrupt leaders.
Jones rejected even the few required tenets of the Disciples of Christ denomination. Instead of implementing the sacraments
A sacrament is a Christian rite that is recognized as being particularly important and significant. There are various views on the existence and meaning of such rites. Many Christians consider the sacraments to be a visible symbol of the rea ...
as prescribed by the Disciples, Jones followed Father Divine's holy communion
The Eucharist (; from Greek , , ), also known as Holy Communion and the Lord's Supper, is a Christian rite that is considered a sacrament in most churches, and as an ordinance in others. According to the New Testament, the rite was instituted ...
practices. Jones created his own baptism
Baptism (from grc-x-koine, βάπτισμα, váptisma) is a form of ritual purification—a characteristic of many religions throughout time and geography. In Christianity, it is a Christian sacrament of initiation and adoption, almost ...
al formula, baptizing his converts "in the holy name of Socialism".
While in the United States, Jones remained fearful of the public discovering the full extent of his communist views. He believed that if the true nature of his views became widely known, he would quickly lose the support of political leaders and even face the possibility of Peoples Temple being ejected from the Disciples of Christ. Jones also feared losing the church's tax-exempt status and having to report his financial dealings to the Internal Revenue Service
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the revenue service for the United States federal government, which is responsible for collecting U.S. federal taxes and administering the Internal Revenue Code, the main body of the federal statutory t ...
. Jones took care to always couch his socialist views in religious terms, such as "apostolic social justice". "Living the Acts of the Apostles" was his euphemism for living a communal lifestyle.
Jones frequently warned his followers of an imminent apocalyptic genocidal race war and nuclear war. He claimed that Nazi fascist
Fascism is a far-right, authoritarian, ultra-nationalist political ideology and movement,: "extreme militaristic nationalism, contempt for electoral democracy and political and cultural liberalism, a belief in natural social hierarchy and the ...
s and white supremacists would put people of color into concentration camps. Jones said he was a messiah sent to save people by giving them a place of refuge in his church. Drawing on a prophecy in the Book of Revelation
The Book of Revelation is the final book of the New Testament (and consequently the final book of the Christian Bible). Its title is derived from the first word of the Koine Greek text: , meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The Book of ...
, he taught that American capitalist culture was irredeemable "Babylon
''Bābili(m)''
* sux, 𒆍𒀭𒊏𒆠
* arc, 𐡁𐡁𐡋 ''Bāḇel''
* syc, ܒܒܠ ''Bāḇel''
* grc-gre, Βαβυλών ''Babylṓn''
* he, בָּבֶל ''Bāvel''
* peo, 𐎲𐎠𐎲𐎡𐎽𐎢 ''Bābiru''
* elx, 𒀸𒁀𒉿𒇷 ''Babi ...
". Explaining the nature of sin, Jones stated, "If you're born in capitalist America, racist
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
America, fascist America, then you're born in sin. But if you're born in socialism, you're not born in sin." He taught his followers the only way to escape the supposed imminent catastrophe was to accept his teachings, and that after the apocalypse was over, they would emerge to establish a perfect communist society.
Historians are divided over whether Jones actually believed his own teachings, or was just using them to manipulate people. Jeff Guinn said, "It is impossible to know whether Jones gradually came to think he was God's earthly vessel, or whether he came to that convenient conclusion" to enhance his authority over his followers. In a 1976 phone conversation with John Maher, Jones admitted to be an agnostic
Agnosticism is the view or belief that the existence of God, of the divine or the supernatural is unknown or unknowable. (page 56 in 1967 edition) Another definition provided is the view that "human reason is incapable of providing sufficien ...
and an atheist
Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...
. Marceline admitted in a 1977 ''New York Times'' interview that Jones was trying to promote Marxism in the U.S. by mobilizing people through religion, citing Mao Zedong as his inspiration: "Jim used religion to try to get some people out of the opiate of religion." She told the reporter that Jones had once slammed the Bible on the table yelling "I've got to destroy this paper idol!" Jones taught his followers that the ends justify the means and authorized them to achieve his vision by any means necessary. Outsiders would later point to this aspect of Jones's teachings to allege that he did not genuinely believe in his own teachings and that he was "morally bankrupt" and only manipulating religion and other elements of society "to achieve his own selfish ends".
Jones began using illicit drugs after moving to California, which further heightened his paranoia. Jones increasingly used fear to control and manipulate his followers in California. Jones frequently warned his followers that there was an enemy seeking to destroy them. The identify of that enemy changed over time from the Ku Klux Klan, to Nazis, to redneck vigilantes, and finally the American government. He frequently prophesied that fires, car accidents, and death or injuries would come upon anyone unfaithful to him and his teachings. He constantly told his followers that they needed to be crusaders in promoting and fulfilling his beliefs.
Through his tactics, he successfully implemented a communal lifestyle among his followers that was directed by him and his lieutenants who were part of a committee called the Planning Commission. Jones, through the Planning Commission, began controlling all aspects of the lives of his followers. Members who joined Peoples Temple were required to turn over all their assets to the church in exchange for free room and board. Many members working outside of the Temple were also required to turn over all their income to be used for the benefit of the community. Jones directed groups of his followers to work on various projects to earn income for the People Temple and set up an agricultural operation in Redwood Valley to grow food. Jones organized large community outreach projects, taking his followers by bus to perform work community service across the region.
The first known cases of serious abuse in Peoples Temple arose in California as the Planning Commission carried out discipline against members who were not fulfilling Jones's vision or following the rules. Jones's control over the members of Peoples Temple extended to their sex lives and who could be married. Some members were coerced to get abortion
Abortion is the termination of a pregnancy by removal or expulsion of an embryo or fetus. An abortion that occurs without intervention is known as a miscarriage or "spontaneous abortion"; these occur in approximately 30% to 40% of pre ...
s. Jones began to require sexual favors from the wives of some members of the church. Jones also raped several male members of his congregation.
Members who rebelled against Jones's control were punished with reduced food rations, harsher work schedules, public ridicule and humiliations, and sometimes with physical violence. As the Temple's membership grew, Jones created a security group to ensure order among his followers and to ensure his own personal safety. The group purchased security squad cars and armed their guards with rifles and pistols.
Urban expansion
Because of limited expansion in the Redwood Valley- Ukiah area, it eventually seemed necessary to move the church's seat of power to an urban area. In 1970, the Temple began holding services inSan Francisco
San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17t ...
and Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...
.Kilduff, Marshall and Phil Tracy"Inside Peoples Temple."
''New West Magazine''. August 1, 1977 (hosted at Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University). It established permanent facilities in those cities in 1971 and 1972, respectively.Reiterman 1982. p. 164. In San Francisco, the Temple occupied a former Scottish Rite temple at 1859 Geary Boulevard; in Los Angeles, the Temple occupied the former building of the First Church of Christ, Scientist at 1366 S. Alvarado Street.
By 1972, the Temple called Redwood Valley the "mother church" of a "statewide political movement". From the start, the Los Angeles facility's primary purposes were to recruit members and to serve as a waystation for the Temple's weekly bus trips across California. The Temple set up permanent staff in Los Angeles and arranged bus trips there every other week. The substantial attendance and collections in Los Angeles helped support the Temple's inflated membership claims. The Los Angeles facility was larger than San Francisco's. Its central location at the corner of Alvarado and Hoover Streets permitted easy geographic access for a large black membership from Watts
Watts is plural for ''watt'', the unit of power.
Watts may also refer to:
People
* Watts (surname), list of people with the surname Watts Fictional characters
*Watts, main character in the film '' Some Kind of Wonderful''
* Watts family, six cha ...
and Compton.
Recruiting drives in Los Angeles and San Francisco helped increase membership in the Temple from a few hundred to nearly 3,000 by the mid-1970s. Later, when the Temple's headquarters shifted from Redwood Valley to San Francisco, the Temple convinced many Los Angeles members to move north to its new headquarters.
Organizational structure
Although some descriptions of the Peoples Temple emphasize Jones's autocratic control over its operations, in reality, the Temple possessed a complex leadership structure with decision-making power unevenly dispersed among its members. Within that structure, Temple members were unwittingly and gradually subjected to sophisticated mind control andbehavior modification
Behavior modification is an early approach that used respondent and operant conditioning to change behavior. Based on methodological behaviorism, overt behavior was modified with consequences, including positive and negative reinforcement conti ...
techniques borrowed from post-revolutionary China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, most populous country, with a Population of China, population exceeding 1.4 billion, slig ...
and North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu (Amnok) and T ...
.Reiterman 1982. pp. 163–164. The Temple tightly defined psychological boundaries that "enemies", such as "traitors" to the Temple, crossed at their own peril. While the secrecy and caution Jones demanded in recruiting led to decreased overall membership, they also helped him foster hero-worship of himself as the "ultimate socialist".
In the 1970s, the Temple established a more formal hierarchy for its socialistic model.Reiterman 1982. pp. 156–159. At the top were the Temple's staff, a select group of predominantly college-educated white women that undertook the Temple's most sensitive missions. They necessarily acclimated themselves to an " ends justify the means" philosophy. The earliest member was Sandy Bradshaw, a socialist from Syracuse
Syracuse may refer to:
Places Italy
* Syracuse, Sicily, or spelled as ''Siracusa''
* Province of Syracuse
United States
*Syracuse, New York
**East Syracuse, New York
** North Syracuse, New York
* Syracuse, Indiana
*Syracuse, Kansas
*Syracuse, M ...
, New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
. Others included Carolyn Layton, a communist since the age of 15 who had a child with Jones; Sharon Amos, who worked for the social services department; Patty Cartmell, Jones's secretary; and Teri Buford, a Navy
A navy, naval force, or maritime force is the branch of a nation's armed forces principally designated for naval and amphibious warfare; namely, lake-borne, riverine, littoral, or ocean-borne combat operations and related functions. It in ...
brat turned pacifist
Pacifism is the opposition or resistance to war, militarism (including conscription and mandatory military service) or violence. Pacifists generally reject theories of Just War. The word ''pacifism'' was coined by the French peace campai ...
. The group was often scorned as elitist within the egalitarian Temple organization and viewed as secret police
Secret police (or political police) are intelligence, security or police agencies that engage in covert operations against a government's political, religious, or social opponents and dissidents. Secret police organizations are characteristic ...
.
The Temple's Planning Commission was its governing board.Reiterman 1982. pp. 160–163.Lewis, Mike"Jones disciple recovers from, recalls painful past."
''Seattle Post-Intelligencer''. November 19, 2003. Membership quickly ballooned from 50 to over 100. During the week, members convened for meetings in various Redwood Valley locations, sometimes until dawn. The Planning Commission was responsible for the Temple's day-to-day operations, including key decision-making, financial and legal planning, and oversight. The Commission sat over various other committees, such as the Diversions Committee, which carried out tasks such as writing huge numbers of letters to politicians from fictional people mailed from various locations around the U.S., and the Mertles Committee, which undertook activities against defectors Al and Jeannie Mills.Hall 1987, pp. 178–184 A group of rank-and-file members, whom outsiders called the "troops", consisted of working-class members who were 70–80% black. They set up chairs for meetings, filled offering boxes, and did other tasks. Many of them were attracted to the Temple's quasi-socialist approach both because of the Temple's political education offers and because the Temple's highly passionate congregations still maintained the familiar forms of evangelical prayers and black gospels. Jones also surrounded himself with several dozen mostly white, privileged members in their twenties and thirties who had skills in law, accounting, nursing, teaching, music, and administration. This latter group carried out public relations, financial duties, and more mundane chores while bringing in good salaries from well-paying outside jobs.
Recruiting, faith healings, and fund raising
The Temple used ten to fifteen Greyhound-type bus cruisers to transport members up and down California freeways each week for recruitment and fundraising.Reiterman 1982. pp. 166–168. Jones always rode in bus number seven, which contained armed guards and a special section lined with protective metal plates. He told members that the Temple would not bother scheduling a trip unless it could net $100,000, and the Temple's goal for annual net income from bus trips was $1 million. Beginning in the 1970s, the bus caravan also traveled across the U.S. quarterly, including to Washington, D.C. In June 1973, Representative George Brown, Jr. entered a lengthy and laudatory description of the Temple into the ''Congressional Record
The ''Congressional Record'' is the official record of the proceedings and debates of the United States Congress, published by the United States Government Publishing Office and issued when Congress is in session. The Congressional Record Inde ...
''. ''The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...
'' ran an August 18, 1973, editorial-page item stating that the 660 Temple visitors were the "hands down winners of anybody's tourists of the year award" after spending an hour cleaning up the Capitol grounds.
The Temple distributed pamphlets in cities along the route of these fundraising trips bragging of Jones's prowess at "spiritual healing" without mentioning the Temple's Marxist goals. Stops included large cities such as Houston
Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...
, Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
, and Cleveland
Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the United States, U.S. U.S. state, state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County, Ohio, Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along ...
. Temple members pretended to be locals and acted as shill
A shill, also called a plant or a stooge, is a person who publicly helps or gives credibility to a person or organization without disclosing that they have a close relationship with said person or organization. Shills can carry out their operatio ...
s in the various faked healings and "revelations". Local viewers did not realize they were in the minority in the audience. The weekly take from offerings and healing services was $15,000 to $25,000 in Los Angeles and $8,000 to $12,000 in San Francisco. There were smaller collections from trips around the "mother church" in Redwood Valley.
The Temple also set up Truth Enterprises, a direct mailing branch that sent out 30,000 to 50,000 mailers monthly to people who had attended Temple services or written to the Temple after listening to Temple radio programs.Reiterman 1982. pp. 169–171. Donations were mailed in from all over the continental U.S., Hawaii, South America, and Europe. In addition to receiving donations, the Temple sold trinkets, such as pieces of Jones's robes, healing oil, Temple rings, key chains, and lockets. In peak periods, mailer revenue grossed $300 to $400 daily. This figure even surprised Jones.
Although Jones had earlier asked Temple members to destroy photos of him because he did not want members worshiping him as Catholics "worshiped plaster statues", Jeannie and Al Mills (who would later defect) convinced Jones to sell anointed and blessed photos to raise money. Jones worried that "they're gonna get me for mail fraud someday." In 1973, the Temple also formed Brotherhood Records, a subsidiary record label
A record label, or record company, is a brand or trademark of music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a publishing company that manages such brands and trademarks, coordinates the pr ...
that produced music from the Temple's "large interracial youth choir and orchestra".Kilduff, Marshall and Ron Javers. ''Suicide Cult: The Inside Story of the Peoples Temple Sect and the Massacre in Guyana''. Bantam Books, New York, 1978. . p. 42.
Size and scope
Despite exaggerated claims by the Temple of 20,000 or more members, one source claims its greatest actual registered membership was around 3,000. However, 5,000 individual membership card photos were located in Temple records after its dissolution. Regardless of its official membership, the Temple also regularly drew 3,000 people to its San Francisco services alone. Of particular interest to politicians was the Temple's ability to produce 2,000 people for campaign work or attendance in San Francisco on only six hours' notice. By the mid-1970s, in addition to its locations in Redwood Valley, Los Angeles and San Francisco, the Temple had established satellite congregations in almost a dozen other California cities. Jones mentioned locations in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Ukiah,Bakersfield
Bakersfield is a city in Kern County, California, United States. It is the county seat and largest city of Kern County. The city covers about near the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley and the Central Valley region. Bakersfield's populat ...
, Fresno, and Sacramento
)
, image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg
, mapsize = 250x200px
, map_caption = Location within Sacramento ...
. The Temple also maintained a branch, college tuition program, and dormitory at Santa Rosa Junior College.
At the same time, Jones and his church earned a reputation for aiding the cities' poorest citizens, especially racial minorities, drug addicts, and the homeless. The Temple made strong connections to the California state welfare system. During the 1970s, the church owned and ran at least nine residential care homes for the elderly, six homes for foster children
Foster care is a system in which a minor has been placed into a ward, group home (residential child care community, treatment center, etc.), or private home of a state- certified caregiver, referred to as a "foster parent" or with a family me ...
, and a state-licensed ranch for developmentally disabled
Developmental disability is a diverse group of chronic conditions, comprising mental or physical impairments that arise before adulthood. Developmental disabilities cause individuals living with them many difficulties in certain areas of life, espe ...
persons. The Temple elite handled members' insurance claims and legal problems, effectively acting as a client-advocacy group. For these reasons, sociologist John Hall described the Temple as a "charismatic bureaucracy", oriented toward Jones as a charismatic leader, but functioning as a bureaucratic social service organization.
Kinsolving series
In 1972, the ''San Francisco Examiner
The ''San Francisco Examiner'' is a newspaper distributed in and around San Francisco, California, and published since 1863.
Once self-dubbed the "Monarch of the Dailies" by then-owner William Randolph Hearst, and flagship of the Hearst Corporat ...
'' and the ''Indianapolis Star
Indianapolis (), colloquially known as Indy, is the state capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Indiana and the seat of Marion County. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the consolidated population of Indianapolis and Marion ...
'' ran the first four parts of a seven-part story on the Temple by Lester Kinsolving
__NOTOC__
Charles Lester Kinsolving, known as Les Kinsolving (December 18, 1927 – December 4, 2018), was an American political talk radio host, previously heard on WCBM in Baltimore, Maryland. He is known for being the first White House corr ...
, its first public exposé.Reiterman 1982. pp. 211–214. Kinsolving reported on several aspects of church dealings, its claims of healings, and Jones's ritual of throwing Bibles down in church, yelling, "This black book has held down you people for 2,000 years. It has no power." Temple members picketed the ''Examiner'', harassed the paper's editor, and threatened both the ''Examiner'' and the ''Star'' with libel
Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defi ...
suits. Both papers canceled the series after the fourth installment. Shortly thereafter, Jones made grants to newspapers in California with the stated goal of supporting the First Amendment
First or 1st is the ordinal form of the number one (#1).
First or 1st may also refer to:
*World record, specifically the first instance of a particular achievement
Arts and media Music
* 1$T, American rapper, singer-songwriter, DJ, and reco ...
.
Defections
Some defections occurred, most especially in 1973, when eight young members known as the "Gang of Eight" defected together.Reiterman 1982. p. 224. Because the Gang of Eight were aware of threats to potential defectors, they suspected Jones would send a search party to look for them. Their fears proved correct: Jones employed multiple search parties, including one which scanned highways from a rented airplane.Reiterman 1982. p. 225. The Gang of Eight drove three trucks loaded with firearms towardCanada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...
, avoiding U.S. Highway 101
U.S. Route 101, or U.S. Highway 101 (US 101), is a north–south United States Numbered Highway that runs through the states of California, Oregon, and Washington, on the West Coast of the United States. It is also known as (The Royal Roa ...
. Because they feared taking firearms over the U.S.–Canada border, the group traveled instead to the hills of Montana
Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columb ...
, where they wrote a long letter documenting their complaints.
Former Temple member Jeannie Mills later wrote that Jones called thirty members to his home and forebodingly declared that, in light of the mass defection, "in order to keep our apostolic socialism, we should all kill ourselves and leave a note saying that because of harassment, a socialist group cannot exist at this time." Jones became furious, waving a pistol
A pistol is a handgun, more specifically one with the chamber integral to its gun barrel, though in common usage the two terms are often used interchangeably. The English word was introduced in , when early handguns were produced in Europe, a ...
at the Planning Commission and referring to the Gang of Eight as " Trotskyite defectors" and "Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola, or Coke, is a carbonated soft drink manufactured by the Coca-Cola Company. Originally marketed as a temperance bar, temperance drink and intended as a patent medicine, it was invented in the late 19th century by John Stith Pembe ...
revolutionaries".Reiterman 1982. p. 226. While the Temple did not execute the suicide plan Jones described, it did conduct fake suicide rituals in the years that followed.''Paranoia And Delusions''Time Magazine, December 11, 1978
San Francisco Temple
The move to San Francisco permitted Jones to be more open with his true political and theological leanings. p. 161 By spring 1976, Jones openly admitted even to outsiders that he was an atheist. Despite the Temple's fear that the Internal Revenue Service
The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) is the revenue service for the United States federal government, which is responsible for collecting U.S. federal taxes and administering the Internal Revenue Code, the main body of the federal statutory t ...
(IRS) was investigating its religious tax exemption
Tax exemption is the reduction or removal of a liability to make a compulsory payment that would otherwise be imposed by a ruling power upon persons, property, income, or transactions. Tax-exempt status may provide complete relief from taxes, redu ...
, Marceline admitted to ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' in 1977 that her husband, taking inspiration from Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong pronounced ; also Romanization of Chinese, romanised traditionally as Mao Tse-tung. (26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976), also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who was the List of national founde ...
, was trying to achieve social change by mobilizing people through religion. She admitted that, "Jim used religion to try to get some people out of the opiate of religion" and had slammed the Bible on the table yelling, "I've got to destroy this paper idol!"
With the move into San Francisco, the Temple more strenuously emphasized that its members live communally.Reiterman 1982. p. 256. It stressed physical discipline of children first, and then adults.Reiterman 1982. p. 259. The San Francisco Temple also carefully vetted newcomers through an extensive observation process.
The Temple distinguished itself from most new religious movements with its overtly political message.Reiterman 1982. p. 280. It combined those genuine political sympathies with the perception that it could help turn out large numbers of votes to gain the support of a number of prominent politicians. Jones made it known after he moved to San Francisco that he was interested in politics, and legal changes in the way San Francisco elections were held strengthened the power of neighborhood groups and civic organizations such as the Temple.''Los Angeles Herald Examiner'', "The Political Pull of Jim Jones", November 21, 1978 Reiterman 1982. p. 263.
After the Temple's voter mobilization efforts proved instrumental in state Senate President George Moscone's run for mayor of San Francisco in 1975, he appointed Jones as Chairman of the San Francisco Housing Authority Commission.Kinsolving, Kathleen and Tom"Madman in Our Midst: Jim Jones and the California Cover Up."
1998. Steven Alan Hassan's Freedom of Mind Center. Retrieved October 14, 2010.
PBS.org. Jones and the Temple received the support of California political figures such as Moscone, Governor
Jerry Brown
Edmund Gerald Brown Jr. (born April 7, 1938) is an American lawyer, author, and politician who served as the 34th and 39th governor of California from 1975 to 1983 and 2011 to 2019. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected Secretary of S ...
, Congressman Mervyn Dymally, state Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, Assemblyman Art Agnos
Arthur Christ Agnos (born Arthouros Agnos; [] September 1, 1938) is an American politician. He served as the 39th Mayor of San Francisco, mayor of San Francisco, California from 1988 to 1992 and as the Regional Head of the United States Department ...
, and Supervisor Harvey Milk.Layton 1999, p. 105. Willie Brown visited the Temple numerous times and spoke publicly in support of Jones, even after investigations and suspicions of cult activity. Jones and Moscone met privately with Presidential nominee Jimmy Carter's then-running mate, U.S. Senator Walter Mondale
Walter Frederick "Fritz" Mondale (January 5, 1928 – April 19, 2021) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 42nd vice president of the United States from 1977 to 1981 under President Jimmy Carter. A U.S. senator from Minnesota ...
in San Francisco days before the 1976 presidential election. Jones also met First Lady
First lady is an unofficial title usually used for the wife, and occasionally used for the daughter or other female relative, of a non- monarchical head of state or chief executive. The term is also used to describe a woman seen to be at the ...
Rosalynn Carter on multiple occasions, including a private dinner, and corresponded with her in letters.Jim Jones"Transcript of Recovered FBI tape Q 799."
''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. Jones used his position at the Housing Authority to lead the fight against the eviction of tenants from San Francisco's International Hotel.Reiterman 1982. pp. 282–283. The Temple further forged an alliance with San Francisco's Black community newspaper, the ''Sun Reporter'' publisher Dr. Carlton Goodlett and it received frequent favorable mentions in that paper.Reiterman 1982. p. 265. It also received frequent favorable coverage from ''
San Francisco Chronicle
The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and Michael H. de Young. The pa ...
'' columnist Herb Caen
Herbert Eugene Caen (; April 3, 1916 February 1, 1997) was a San Francisco humorist and journalist whose daily column of local goings-on and insider gossip, social and political happenings, and offbeat puns and anecdotes—"A continuous love le ...
and other local newspaper and television reporters.Reiterman 1982. pp. 285, 306, 587.
However, the Temple aroused police suspicion after Jones praised the Symbionese Liberation Army, a radical Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Gov ...
group, and the SLA's leaders attended San Francisco Temple meetings.Reiterman 1982. p. 236. Further suspicions were raised after the defection of Joyce Shaw and the mysterious death soon after of her husband, Bob Houston.Reiterman 1982. pp. 299–300.
In 1974 a fire broke out at Peoples Temple's San Francisco location. Without evidence Jones speculated that members of the Nation of Islam
The Nation of Islam (NOI) is a religious and political organization founded in the United States by Wallace Fard Muhammad in 1930.
A black nationalist organization, the NOI focuses its attention on the African diaspora, especially on African ...
may have started the fire. Jones sent several of his followers to a nearby mosque to issue a warning to their group. This began a period of heightened tensions between Peoples Temple and the Nation of Islam. Gradually, Jones worked to improve relations with the Nation of Islam, culminating a joint "Spiritual Jubilee" rally held at the Los Angeles Convention Center
The Los Angeles Convention Center is a convention center in the southwest section of downtown Los Angeles. It hosts multiple annual conventions and has often been used as a filming location in TV shows and movies.
History
The convention center, ...
in May 1976. He used the event to garner positive publicity, and the joint rally was attended by many of his closest political acquaintances. At the rally, Jones called for peace and unity saying, "if the Peoples Temple and the Nation of Islam can get together, anyone can." Jones ended by pledging support to the Muslim community and declared his desire for Wallace Muhammad to run for President of the United States.
While the Temple forged media alliances, the move to San Francisco also opened the group to media scrutiny. When Jones and hundreds of Temple members moved to the Temple's Guyana
Guyana ( or ), officially the Cooperative Republic of Guyana, is a country on the northern mainland of South America. Guyana is an indigenous word which means "Land of Many Waters". The capital city is Georgetown. Guyana is bordered by the ...
settlement following media investigations, Mayor Moscone issued a press release stating that his office would not investigate the Temple.Moore, Rebecca. ''A Sympathetic History of Jonestown''. Lewiston, New York: Edwin Mellen Press
The Edwin Mellen Press or Mellen Press is an international independent company and academic publishing house with editorial offices in Lewiston, New York, and Lampeter, Wales. It was founded, in 1972, by the religious studies scholar Profess ...
. p. 143. During this time, Milk spoke at Temple political rallies and wrote a letter to President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
* President (education), a leader of a college or university
* President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ...
Jimmy Carter
James Earl Carter Jr. (born October 1, 1924) is an American politician who served as the 39th president of the United States from 1977 to 1981. A member of the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party, he previously served as th ...
after the investigations began, in which he accused Timothy Stoen, who by that point had defected from the Temple and was attempting to extricate relatives from Guyana, of telling "bold-faced lies".Milk, Harvey''Letter Addressed to President Jimmy Carter, Dated February 19, 1978''
Mass murder/suicide at Jonestown, Guyana
In 1974, the Peoples Temple signed a lease to rent land in Guyana. The community which was established on this piece of property was named the Peoples Temple Agricultural Project, its informal name was "Jonestown". The settlement had as few as fifty residents in early 1977.''Entry to Guyana''Alternatives Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple, San Diego State University Jones saw Jonestown as both a "socialist paradise" and a "sanctuary" from media scrutiny that had started with the Kinsolving articles. Former Temple member Tim Carter said the Temple moved to Jonestown because "in '74, what we saw in the United States was creeping fascism."Tim Carter
''There was no choice in Jonestown that day...''
Oregon Public Broadcasting Radio interview. April 9, 2007. Carter explained, "It was apparent that corporations, or the multinationals, were getting much larger, their influence was growing within the government, and the United States is a racist place." He said the Temple concluded that Guyana was "a place in a black country where our black members could live in peace", "it was a socialist government" and it was "the only English-speaking country in South America." Increasing media scrutiny based on allegations by former members placed further pressure on Jones, especially after a 1977 article by Marshall Kilduff in ''
New West
New West Records is a record label based in Nashville, Tennessee, and Athens, Georgia. It had offices in Burbank, California, and Beverly Hills, California. The label was established in 1998 by Cameron Strang "for artists who perform real musi ...
'' magazine. Just before publication of the ''New West'' piece, editor Rosalie Wright telephoned Jones to read him the article. Wright explained that she was only doing so before publication because of "all the support letters we received on your behalf, from the Governor of California
The governor of California is the head of government of the U.S. state of California. The governor is the commander-in-chief of the California National Guard and the California State Guard.
Established in the Constitution of California, t ...
erry Brown and others.Layton 1999, p. 113.
While still on the phone listening to the allegations contained in the article, Jones wrote a note to Temple members in the room with him that said, "We leave tonight. Notify Georgetown (Guyana)." After Jones left for Guyana, he encouraged Temple members to follow him there. The population grew to over 900 people by late 1978. Those who moved there were promised a tropical paradise free from the supposed wickedness of the outside world.
On November 17, 1978, Representative Leo Ryan
Leo Joseph Ryan Jr. (May 5, 1925 – November 18, 1978) was an American teacher and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. representative from California's 11th congressional district from 1973 until his assassinati ...
, who was investigating claims of abuse within the Temple, visited Jonestown. During his visit, a number of Temple members expressed a desire to leave with him,Reiterman 1982. p. 512. and, on November 18, some accompanied Ryan to the local airstrip at Port Kaituma
Port Kaituma is a small village within the Barima-Waini administrative region of Guyana. It became known internationally as a gateway village to the Peoples Temple settlement in nearby Jonestown. It has long been a hub for mining in the area.
...
. There they were intercepted by self-styled Temple security guards who opened fire on the group, killing Ryan, three journalists, and one of the defectors as well as injuring nine others, including Ryan's aide, Jackie Speier
Karen Lorraine Jacqueline Speier ( ; born May 14, 1950) is an American lawyer and politician serving as the U.S. representative for , serving in Congress since 2008. She is a member of the Democratic Party. The district, numbered as the 12th Dis ...
.Reiterman 1982. pp. 529–531. A few seconds of gunfire from the incident were captured on video by NBC cameraman Bob Brown, one of the journalists killed in the attack. Though she was shot five times, including suffering a massive leg wound, Speier survived and won a seat in Congress in 2008, serving until she declined to run for reelection in 2022.Jackie Spier was shot 5 times during the Jonestown massacre, she said it made her fearless''
CBC Radio
CBC Radio is the English-language radio operations of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. The CBC operates a number of radio networks serving different audiences and programming niches, all of which (regardless of language) are outlined belo ...
'', November 21, 2018. Retrieved July 28, 2022. That evening, in Jonestown, Jones ordered his congregation to drink a concoction of cyanide
Cyanide is a naturally occurring, rapidly acting, toxic chemical that can exist in many different forms.
In chemistry, a cyanide () is a chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of ...
-laced, grape-flavored Flavor Aid
Flavor Aid is a non-carbonated soft drink beverage made by The Jel Sert Company in West Chicago, Illinois. It was introduced in 1929. It is sold throughout the United States as an unsweetened, powdered concentrate drink mix, similar to Kool ...
."Jonestown Audiotape Primary Project"''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University. In all, 918 people died, including 276 children. This includes four that died at the Temple headquarters that night in the Guyanese capital of Georgetown. Some members resisted committing "revolutionary suicide," and were injected with fatal doses of cyanide, as were infants, and others survived by fleeing through the jungle. It was the greatest single loss of American civilian life in a deliberate act until the events of September 11, 2001.Knapp, Don
"Jonestown massacre + 20: Questions linger."
CNN.com. November 18, 1998. Retrieved April 9, 2007.
Leo Ryan
Leo Joseph Ryan Jr. (May 5, 1925 – November 18, 1978) was an American teacher and politician. A member of the Democratic Party, he served as the U.S. representative from California's 11th congressional district from 1973 until his assassinati ...
Aftermath
The Temple's San Francisco headquarters was besieged by the national media and the relatives of the Jonestown victims.Reiterman 1982. p. 573 The mass killing became one of the best-known events in U.S. history as measured by the Gallup poll and appeared on the cover of several newspapers and magazines, including ''Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...
'', for months afterward.Hall, John R. ''Gone from the Promised Land: Jonestown in American Cultural History''. 1989. . p. 289.
In addition, according to various press reports, after the Jonestown suicides, surviving Temple members in the U.S. announced their fears of being targeted by a "hit squad" which would be composed of Jonestown survivors. Similarly, in 1979, the Associated Press
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. new ...
reported a U.S. Congressional aide's claim that there were "120 white, brainwashed assassins out from Jonestown awaiting the trigger word to pick up their hit."
Temple insider Michael Prokes, who had been ordered to deliver a suitcase which contained Temple funds which were supposed to be transferred to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
" Hymn of the Bolshevik Party"
, headquarters = 4 Staraya Square, Moscow
, general_secretary = Vladimir Lenin (first) Mikhail Gorbachev (last)
, founded =
, banned =
, founder = Vladimir Lenin
, newspape ...
,Reiterman 1982. pp. 561–580."Letter to Feodor Timofeyev."''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. Jonestown Project: San Diego State University. killed himself in March 1979, four months after the Jonestown incident. In the days leading up to his death, Prokes sent notes to several people, together with a thirty-page statement he had written about the Temple. Caen reprinted one copy in his ''Chronicle'' column. Prokes then arranged for a press conference in a
Modesto, California
Modesto () is the county seat and largest city of Stanislaus County, California, United States. With a population of 218,464 at the 2020 census, it is the 19th largest city in the state of California and forms part of the Sacramento-Stockton- ...
motel room, during which he read a statement to the eight reporters who attended. He then excused himself, entered a restroom, and fatally shot himself in the head."Statement of Michael Prokes."''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University: Jonestown Project. Retrieved September 22, 2007. Before the tragedy, Temple member Paula Adams engaged in a romantic relationship with Guyana's Ambassador to the United States, Laurence "Bonny" Mann. Adams later married Mann.Weingarten, Gene
''The Washington Post''. January 22, 2006. On October 24, 1983, Mann fatally shot both Adams and the couple's child, and then fatally shot himself. Defecting member Harold Cordell lost twenty family members on the evening of the poisonings. The Bogues family, which had also defected, lost its daughter Marilee (age 18), while defector Vernon Gosney lost his son Mark (age 5). The mass suicide of the Peoples Temple has helped embed the idea that all
new religious movement
A new religious movement (NRM), also known as alternative spirituality or a new religion, is a religious or Spirituality, spiritual group that has modern origins and is peripheral to its society's dominant religious culture. NRMs can be novel in ...
s are destructive in the public's mind. Bryan R. Wilson
Bryan Ronald Wilson (25 June 1926 – 9 October 2004), was Reader Emeritus in Sociology at the University of Oxford and President of the International Society for the Sociology of Religion (1971–75). He became a Fellow of All Souls College, ...
argues against that point of view by pointing out that only four other such events have occurred within similar religious groups: the Branch Davidians
The Branch Davidians (or the General Association of Branch Davidian Seventh-day Adventists) were an apocalyptic new religious movement founded in 1955 by Benjamin Roden. They regard themselves as a continuation of the General Association of ...
, the Solar Temple, Aum Shinrikyo and Heaven's Gate.
Bankruptcy and dissolution
At the end of 1978, the Temple declared bankruptcy, and its assets went intoreceivership
In law, receivership is a situation in which an institution or enterprise is held by a receiver—a person "placed in the custodial responsibility for the property of others, including tangible and intangible assets and rights"—especially in c ...
."What happened to Peoples Temple after 18 November 1978?"''Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple''. San Diego State University: Jonestown Project. 2007-03-08. In light of lawsuits, on December 4, 1978,
Charles Garry
Charles R. Garry (March 17, 1909 – August 16, 1991) was an Armenian-American civil rights attorney who represented a number of high-profile clients in political cases during the 1960s and 1970s, including Huey P. Newton during his 1968 capital ...
, the corporation's attorney, petitioned to dissolve the Temple. The petition was granted in San Francisco Superior Court in January 1979. A few Temple members remained in Guyana through May 1979 in order to wrap up the movement's affairs, then they returned to the United States.
The Temple's buildings in Los Angeles, Indianapolis, and Redwood Valley are all intact, as is the Temple's former Georgetown headquarters. Some former Temple buildings, such as the Los Angeles facility, are presently used by church congregations.AdventistChurchConnect.org.
1989 Loma Prieta earthquake
The 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake occurred on California's Central Coast on October 17 at local time. The shock was centered in The Forest of Nisene Marks State Park in Santa Cruz County, approximately northeast of Santa Cruz on a section of t ...
; the site is now occupied by a Post Office
A post office is a public facility and a retailer that provides mail services, such as accepting letters and parcels, providing post office boxes, and selling postage stamps, packaging, and stationery. Post offices may offer additional se ...
branch.
See also
* Mass suicide *Branch Davidians
The Branch Davidians (or the General Association of Branch Davidian Seventh-day Adventists) were an apocalyptic new religious movement founded in 1955 by Benjamin Roden. They regard themselves as a continuation of the General Association of ...
* Heaven's Gate
* Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God
The Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God was a religious movement founded by Credonia Mwerinde and Joseph Kibweteere in southwestern Uganda. It was formed in 1989 after Mwerinde and Kibweteere claimed that they had seen vi ...
* Order of the Solar Temple
Notes
References
Sources
* * * * * * *Further reading
* Klineman, George and Sherman Butler. ''The Cult That Died''. G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1980. . * Naipaul, Shiva. ''Black and White''. London, 1980. . * Bebelaar, Judy and Ron Cabral. "And Then They Were Gone: Teenagers of Peoples Temple". Sugartown Publishing, 2018. .External links
San Diego State University: Extensive site with source documents, list of dead, pictures
Audio Recording of Jonestown Suicide
* Isaacson, Barry
From Silver Lake to Suicide: One Family's Secret History of the Jonestown Massacre
605 Adults 304 Children
a 2019 short documentary filmed entirely by The Peoples Temple at Jonestown {{Authority control 1955 establishments in California Apocalyptic groups Cults African-American history in San Francisco Christian new religious movements History of the San Francisco Bay Area Post–civil rights era in African-American history Religion in the San Francisco Bay Area Religious organizations disestablished in 1978 Religious organizations established in 1955 Religious belief systems founded in the United States 1954 establishments in Indiana Anti-Americanism Far-left politics in the United States