Jim Jones was some sort of religious leader (or better, a cult leader). His followers worshiped him as an oracle of divinity and his words were carried out to the last word. He led an organization known simply as the People’s Temple – a cult group where he brainwashed everyone into seeing him as their God and Messiah. Jones performed staged miracles among the people, which further strengthened his “belief” in him as divine. Worse still, where incidents of sexual abuse, pedophilia and rape have been reported within the organization.
However, the People’s Temple was a trip to what would become one of the worst cases of mass suicide in the United States. Jones, who knew that government authorities were now on his trail (following his assassination of a US Congressman), convinced his 900+ followers, including children on November 18, 1978, to consume a drink to punch containing cyanide they all did and met their untimely death.
Jim Jones Bio
Jim Jones was born in Crete, Indiana on May 13, 1931, with the name of James Warren Jones. His parents were James Thurman Jones and Lynetta Putnam. His father fought in World War I and was disabled from injuries he suffered during the war when his mother was busy with so many jobs and both had little time for Jones while he was growing up. When his parents divorced, his mother moved with him to Richmond and he enrolled in Richmond High School where he graduated in 1948. For his college education, he attended Indiana University in Bloomington, then Butler University, where he majored in secondary education.
Young Jones, who was of Irish and Welsh descent, lived his life alone and became interested in religious pursuits when his neighbors took him to church. Along with learning about religious activities and how they were conducted, young Jones began to enlighten his mind through books. He was an avid reader and was fascinated by Gandhi, Marx, Hitler and other leaders of the mass movement and he really studied to find out how they succeeded and why they failed.
As a child, he preached to other children the way he had learned or seen preachers do and even when he did, he hardly called anyone “friend”. As a young man, he was isolated and did not engage in extracurricular activities such as sports, partying and the like.
Jones opened up about her relationship with her father, and recalled that they had opposing views on a variety of topics, especially when it came to race. If he was sympathetic to people of color because of the treatment they received at that time (sympathy that stemmed from the fact that he was also a social outcast), his father, on the other hand, who associated to the Ku Klux Klan, would disagree with him (Jones) on this point and would not even let his African-American friend into their home.
Career and movement
One thing was for sure, Jim Jones was growing up disillusioned with the segregation of people of color, something that was prevalent in the United States at the time. He thought of ways to spread his Marxist idea of integration to reach the halls of government and so he decided to use the church.
He joined the Sommerset Southside Methodist Church in 1952 and became a student minister. He would later find that people responded to faith healings and would willingly donate their money in such meetings and so he decided that was his best bet and by 1953 he had gained a reputation as a healer and preacher. Motivated by the need for integration between races – white and black – especially in his services, he found that his church would not share his sentiment, and so he left them to start his own assembly.
After successfully organizing a crusade which was attended by a huge crowd in June 1956, his church metamorphosed into the Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ (formerly known as Wings of Deliverance Church and later Peoples Temple Christian Church Full Gospel). Jones has done his best to end segregation and promote integration among nationals and his efforts have seen many public places, including hospitals, disintegrated.
Jones’ congregation continued to grow. He promised them a utopia – a better life, away from government oppression. He was a worshiper, who influenced so many people through his messages which were heard by thousands on the radio. Its members returned their money and valuables for the cause they believed to be real. However, their donations only inflated Jones’ bank accounts.
One way Jones used to ensure loyalty was through family alliances while projecting himself as “everybody’s dad” and while discouraging his members from having sex, he slept with a majority of his followers and even had children by several women.
Net value
At the time of the massacre, the total net worth (assets and interests) of Jim Jones and the People’s Temple of the Disciples of Christ was estimated at $13 million. This included money found in several banks and money turned over to the Temple’s financial keepers. The sum was used in several colonies linked to the People’s Temple. Some of the money was used to transport the bodies to the United States, for logistics and the burial of unidentified bodies, some was used in legal settlements, and the other parts were given to families and close to the dead.
Jonestown, the “utopian” city
Jones purchased and developed property in Guyana, a state in northern South America and a place to house its growing membership, which at that time numbered around 1,000. Again, he sought to keep them away from society in order to avoid the prying eyes of the media who had begun to question his activities and those of his henchmen. And even though he operated the “city” like a prison yard, with guards stationed at every point, he told his teeming followers he was giving them the land he had promised and preventing anyone from leaving the place he called “Jonestown”.
In order to keep his followers in check and in preparation for a government invasion, he sold the idea of ”dying by suicide” to his followers and constantly told them not to be afraid to die. Intermittently, Jones would force the members of the People’s Temple to drink liquid substances, which he would falsely tell them as poison and so after a while, he would announce that their loyalty was only being tested. He also used the idea of mass suicide to curry favor with the Guyanese government.
Cult Slaughter
Trouble began in paradise when Jim Jones fathered a child with the wife of one of his followers, Timothy Stoen. Stoen, who was the Temple’s attorney, had asked Jones to have sex with his wife Grace and it had resulted in a son, John Victor. After defecting in 1976, Grace Stoen began raising awareness within the Temple about the abuse. She organized protests and sued the Temple for custody of her son, who was retained by Jim Jones. She was also joined by other defectors including Deborah Layton Blakely at the protest and soon it became a national issue.
In November 1978, California Congressman Leo J. Ryan, accompanied by a team of reporters, traveled to Jonestown to see what the situation was at the People’s Temple. After his tour (which ended abruptly), Ryan invited anyone who wanted to go home to come with him. This was not well received by Jones, although he showed no such signs.
As Congressman Ryan and his crew, including 15 defectors headed for the Port Kaituma airstrip, they were ambushed by members of the “Red Brigade,” Peoples Temple guards on the orders of Jim Jones and Congressman Ryan, alongside four others, including one of the defectors, were killed in the attack.
After doing this and knowing what is to come, it was time to leave and a grape flavored drink mixed with cyanide and valium was shared with its 918 members, including 276 children, to drink what was termed the greatest loss of American life before the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He told families to lie together so they could die together.
Was Jones married? – Wife and children
Jim Jones married Marceline Baldwin on June 12, 1949. He met her in Indiana while working in a hospital as a nurse. Marceline was a nurse at the time. They had a very large family which Jones often referred to as a “rainbow family”. The couple who had only one biological child – Stephan Gandhi Jones, born in June 1959 – adopted so many multiracial children including Korean-Americans, Native Americans and African-Americans.
In fact, they were the first white couple to ever retire such (adopt a black child) and it was named James Warren Jones. The other children were named Lew, Suzanne, Stephanie, Agnes and Tim Jones (the latter was previously named Timothy Glen Tupper). Jones had other children by other members of his congregation such as John Victor Stoen – whose parents were the catalysts for the downfall of the Peoples Temple.
Death of Jim Jones – How did he die?
After overseeing the largest mass suicide in the history of the United States (as at this time), rather than trying to escape, Jim Jones decided to die with his herd. According to the information collected, he was found dead along with his wife, Marceline and other high-ranking members and those of the inner circle. He was found with a bullet to the head which, on examination, was reported as a close range shot. This gave the impression that Jones must have shot himself or ordered one of his followers to shoot him (his son believes the latter account to be the truth).