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Speaker 1: If you're going to Send Francisco or Seattle, you should

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Speaker 1: come to our live shows.

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Speaker 2: That's right, well done, Chuck. We are still selling tickets

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Speaker 2: to our live shows on January twenty fourth and twenty

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Speaker 2: six On January twenty fourth in Seattle at the Paramount

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Speaker 2: Theater and on January twenty sixth in San Francisco at

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Speaker 2: Sydney Goldstein Theater. Tickets are still available to come see us.

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Speaker 2: Hats off to Portland for selling out our show at

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Speaker 2: Revolution Hall already, and sorry to everybody who got shut out.

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Speaker 1: That's right. So where can they get tickets at our website?

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Speaker 2: Right?

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Speaker 1: Stuff? Youshould do dot com.

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Speaker 2: Yeah or linktree slash sysk.

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Speaker 1: We'll see everybody.

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Speaker 2: Then.

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Speaker 3: Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's

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Speaker 2: Chuck and Jerry's here too. The Three Amigos, the TWA Musketeers,

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Speaker 2: the Trace Lay Chase, all that back together again in

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Speaker 2: a brand new year four.

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Speaker 3: That's right in our time. This is our first recording

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Speaker 3: after our increasingly long Christmas break, which is just wonderful.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I feel like Jerry sucked us in that first

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Speaker 2: week quite a bit. It was like a quasi work

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Speaker 2: week that we weren't supposed to have, which I'm still

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Speaker 2: a little mad about.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but not recording. So it's a nice long break.

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Speaker 3: But I always feel like we have to kick or

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Speaker 3: at least I have to kick the rust off a

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Speaker 3: little bit.

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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, for sure, for sure. I think we're gonna

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Speaker 2: do great though, because it doesn't feel rusty. I'm sure

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Speaker 2: we'll be rusty, but it didn't feel like we're going

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Speaker 2: to be Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Oh can I say a quick thing too, Yeah, this

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Speaker 3: is something that it didn't occur to me until we

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Speaker 3: were on the break. Like we always like to thank

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Speaker 3: people around the holidays for support and stuff, but I

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Speaker 3: think we should specifically thank people who operate as our

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Speaker 3: back getters and our quasi quality control people because all

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Speaker 3: the time where we get letters from people that say

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Speaker 3: like or emails that say, like, hey, you misspelled this

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Speaker 3: word in the podcast release, but this one came out twice,

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Speaker 3: or this ad is really offensive, so maybe you guys

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Speaker 3: want to double check that, right, that kind of thing,

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Speaker 3: Like it just feels good. People are always really kind

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Speaker 3: and alert us to things that we should be paying

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Speaker 3: attention to because sometimes things slip through, and I just

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Speaker 3: want to say thanks for everyone looking out for us.

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Speaker 2: Man, when did that occur to you? How long have

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Speaker 2: you been hanging on to that one? Not?

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Speaker 3: I mean it was over the break when I think

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Speaker 3: we got a couple of things about either an ad

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Speaker 3: or something, and I was like, you know what, we

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Speaker 3: should thank people for getting our back and letting us

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Speaker 3: alerting us to stuff.

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Speaker 2: So that's what triggered at some emails. You didn't just

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Speaker 2: like sit bowl up right in the middle of the

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Speaker 2: nine I think, oh god, no, well that was nice.

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Speaker 2: If you check. Yeah, we'll start adopting that at the

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Speaker 2: end of the year the holidays or something like that.

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Speaker 2: How about that.

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Speaker 1: Nope, that's the only time we'll ever do it.

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Speaker 2: Oh okay, cool, I'm fine with that too. So we're

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Speaker 2: talking today about something I've been avoiding for a while.

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Speaker 2: I started to look into this and start researching it,

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Speaker 2: and I was going to suggest it a couple of

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Speaker 2: years ago, and I was like, this is one of

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Speaker 2: the bleakest things that's ever happened outside of war in history.

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Speaker 2: It's up there for sure, and it really sucks you

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Speaker 2: in in the grimmest possible way when you have to

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Speaker 2: like really dive into research because we're talking about Jonestown,

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Speaker 2: and for anybody who's even everyone is at least passingly

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Speaker 2: familiar with the word Jonestown, the name Jonestown. Yeah, or

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Speaker 2: you might have heard, you know, the phrase drinking the

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Speaker 2: kool aid, like you've really bought into something. You might

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Speaker 2: even be brainwashed that came out of Jonestown, true or not.

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Speaker 2: And when you talk about it though, it's not something

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Speaker 2: you can talk about flip Ley, it's not something you

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Speaker 2: can just kind of breeze through, Like you really have

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Speaker 2: to get in there and understand what the heck was

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Speaker 2: going on because it's such a bizarre, horrible event. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: that it just really kind of sucks you in, and

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Speaker 2: when you get in there, it really it's grim. It's

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Speaker 2: a grim. It was a grim research event for me.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: I mean it's so grim that a band named themselves

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Speaker 3: after it with a pithy pun attached.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. One of the great band names of all time,

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Speaker 2: Brian jonesown Massacre Out.

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Speaker 1: Did you think that is?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, I think it's a great I.

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Speaker 1: Have a hard time with pun band names, especially the

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Speaker 1: sort of beginning middle end ones.

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Speaker 2: Like Kathleen Turner Overdrive.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know, I don't know.

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Speaker 2: I'm with you. I'm with you on the Kathleen Turner Overdrive.

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Speaker 2: It's clever, but it's one of those ones you hear

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Speaker 2: once and you're like, that's funny. I think the difference

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Speaker 2: between those two bands, though, is the Brian jonesown Massacre

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Speaker 2: act actually like hardcore musicians. Yeah, that have like a

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Speaker 2: bleak enough outlook that they could take that that name

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Speaker 2: and it's not just a like an elbow U in

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Speaker 2: the ribs kind of joke.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and Brian Jones like another classic musician, whereas Kathleen Turner.

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Speaker 3: I love Kathleen Turner, but I don't know, it just

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Speaker 3: seemed a little extra pick.

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Speaker 2: You can't even play the spoons.

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Speaker 1: Oh you kidding, She's a great spooner.

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Speaker 2: Not only did Brian Jones saw Massacre name themselves that,

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Speaker 2: they also have a song called the Ballad of Jim Jones.

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Speaker 2: If you heard that, Oh no, it's it's they got harmonica.

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Speaker 2: It's real kind of Bob dillany interesting. Uh, Yeah, it's

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Speaker 2: really something. It's something to go check out. I don't

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Speaker 2: know if everybody's gonna like them, yeah, but some people

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Speaker 2: probably won't.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, and we should also point out this is a

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Speaker 3: you know, this is the stuff you should know, forty

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Speaker 3: five ish minute overview, like this could be way way

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Speaker 3: longer and multi episodes long if we really got into

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Speaker 3: all the sort of ups and downs of Jim Jones

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Speaker 3: through his odd life.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's a good idea. I wonder if anyone's ever

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Speaker 2: done a multi part of podcast time.

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Speaker 1: Okay, I thought you were a big serious.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, no, totally, I mean yeah, but I'm glad you

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Speaker 2: said that because it is true, Like, there's a lot

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Speaker 2: a lot about this and we'll try to get everything

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Speaker 2: we talk about right though.

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Speaker 1: Right, that's right, And thanks to the grabster for the

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Speaker 1: help on this one.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure, way to go, Grabster. And we should

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Speaker 2: probably say just a I don't even know if we

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Speaker 2: need to give an overview of what happened, We could

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Speaker 2: probably just jump in and start and talk about Jim Jones,

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Speaker 2: the guy at the center of this whole thing.

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Speaker 3: Right, Well, I think people get mad when we do that,

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Speaker 3: assuming that people know. Okay, so maybe just the quickest

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Speaker 3: of spoilers is that on November eighteenth, nineteen seventy eight,

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Speaker 3: more than nine hundred people died in Guyana at the

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Speaker 3: hands of a sadistic cult leader named Jim Jones.

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Speaker 1: And now we can start right.

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Speaker 2: Well, the big twist to all that is he didn't

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Speaker 2: personally kill them physically, he used his power to get

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Speaker 2: them to kill themselves. It's as weird and twisted as that.

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Speaker 2: So Jim Jones is the kind of person, or he

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Speaker 2: was the kind of person who could actually make something

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Speaker 2: like that happen. He was a very very rare individual.

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Speaker 2: I've seen him diagnosed retroactively as psychopathic, and then I

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Speaker 2: think his personality disorders got a little more nuanced. I've

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Speaker 2: seen much more recently that he was a malignant narcissist.

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Speaker 2: There was something wrong with that guy. Something was wrong

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Speaker 2: with Jim Jones from start to finish, but it seems

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Speaker 2: to have gotten way way worse over time. But one

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Speaker 2: thing that he showed a real penchant for early on

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Speaker 2: in life was preaching, not religion. He was not, it

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Speaker 2: turns out, a religious person. He doesn't seem to have

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Speaker 2: believed in much of any of the stuff he was preaching,

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Speaker 2: but preaching was his way of like funneling attention, adoration,

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Speaker 2: money important to himself. He figured out very early.

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Speaker 3: On Yeah, he was on record that he was not

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Speaker 3: so into religion, even though he was tied to various

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Speaker 3: churches over the years, including the one he started, the

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Speaker 3: People's Temple, which we'll talk about in greater detail later.

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Speaker 3: But one thing he was which is I didn't know

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Speaker 3: a ton about the guy, sort of pre jonestown, and

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Speaker 3: I was surprised to learn that he was a sort

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Speaker 3: of a socialist slash communist, anti segregationist who actually did

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Speaker 3: a lot of you know, I hate to characterize it

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Speaker 3: as good work, but it was good work because it's

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Speaker 3: you know, it's hard. He was such an awful human,

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Speaker 3: but he led a lot of deep segregated his causes

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Speaker 3: in Indiana very successfully for a number of years.

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Speaker 2: I saw someone on Reddit say that had he died

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Speaker 2: on the way to California, we would remember him today

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Speaker 2: as one of the early civil rights leaders.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean that's true.

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Speaker 2: It is true, And I get what you're saying, your

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Speaker 2: reticence to like praise him in any way, shape or form,

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Speaker 2: But yeah, he definitely did walk the walk, like he

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Speaker 2: fought for integration at a time when white people were

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Speaker 2: not doing that. Jim Jones was white, we should say,

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Speaker 2: but he mostly learned that he was best preaching generally

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Speaker 2: toward black congregants mm hmm. And that that kind of

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Speaker 2: just drove his desire to to integrate even further, so

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Speaker 2: much so that as he got a little more power,

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Speaker 2: one of the first things he did was become the

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Speaker 2: kind of the civil rights zar for Indianapolis. And he

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Speaker 2: actually it wasn't like just a label that he went

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Speaker 2: around and introduced himself as he went to work and

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Speaker 2: started integrating places in like penalizing places that hadn't integrated

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Speaker 2: yet in Indianapolis.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, Initially he was. He was involved with the

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Speaker 3: Methodist Church. He was involved with them, even though they

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Speaker 3: were not necessarily anti segregationists did not necessarily want their

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Speaker 3: congregations to be of mixed race, but they were apparently

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Speaker 3: supportive of his sort of socialist communist leanings. And this

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Speaker 3: was in the very early nineteen fifties. And we should

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Speaker 3: point out he was married by this point. He got

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Speaker 3: married in nineteen forty nine to a woman named Marceline Baldwin,

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Speaker 3: who was a hospital orderly and love bomber apparently, and

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Speaker 3: a couple of years later they moved to Indianapolis, where

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Speaker 3: that's when he got involved with a Methodist and you know,

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Speaker 3: started sort of spreading his anti segregationist word.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. So after I don't know what happened with the Methodist,

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Speaker 2: but eventually they got sick of him and pushed him

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Speaker 2: out of the church, and he moved over to evangelicalism. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: what he called apostolic socialism. Because one of the things

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Speaker 2: about him, not only did he figure out that preaching

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Speaker 2: was a way to like attract people, he figured out

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Speaker 2: that that religion was a way, it was like a

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Speaker 2: trojan horse to get people to start thinking about socialism, right,

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Speaker 2: because there's so many like parallels between you know, ideal

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Speaker 2: socialism and Christian teaching. Ideal Christian teaching, I should say that,

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Speaker 2: like it's it's pretty easy to get people who are

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Speaker 2: already predisposed toward following Jesus and his Christian teachings to

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Speaker 2: start thinking about taking care of your you know, fellow

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Speaker 2: downtrodden humans too.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

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Speaker 3: And he would eventually get involved in like you were

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Speaker 3: talking about, the evangelicism.

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Speaker 2: Is that the word evangelicism, Yeah, yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 3: And he would fall into fall into the camp of

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Speaker 3: the Pentecostals, and even more so that was a group

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Speaker 3: of I just call it, I guess Pentecostal Plus, which

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Speaker 3: was the Latter Rain movement, and that was like they off,

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Speaker 3: they spun it off from the Pentecostal Church because they

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Speaker 3: were even more sort of out there than the Pentecostals

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Speaker 3: were as far as like, hey, we get prophecies directly

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Speaker 3: from God. Some of us have supernatural powers. They would

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Speaker 3: use sort of sometimes good old fashioned traveling show vaudeville

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Speaker 3: medicine man style stage magic to you know, look like

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Speaker 3: they knew what they were talking about, and it was

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Speaker 3: pretty out there. But he found that that was a

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Speaker 3: pretty good audience for himself. And what he called I

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Speaker 3: mean he basically said, you know, through the manifested Sons

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Speaker 3: of God, which is a doctrine in the Latterine movement, like, hey,

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Speaker 3: God picks out certain special people that he gives like

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Speaker 3: basically the powers of Jesus Christ, and I'm one of them.

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Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, this group of elites will prepare the world

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Speaker 2: at end times for Jesus's return and they are essentially

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Speaker 2: Jesus just divided up into different human forms. And Jim

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Speaker 2: Jones is like, I'm one of those guys too, check

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Speaker 2: me out. So that was like a weird, a weird

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Speaker 2: way to go, but it was also sensible if you

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Speaker 2: look at him from the lens of strictly a huckster

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Speaker 2: who was taking advantage of people. Of course he's going

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Speaker 2: to go into like I'm Jesus by the way, It's

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Speaker 2: just it's just such a lazy way to take advantage

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Speaker 2: of people.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, like he was able to do that

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Speaker 3: because like most cult leaders, he was very charismatic. He

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Speaker 3: was also a strange person. Ed dug up this one

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Speaker 3: story that I had never heard that at one point

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Speaker 3: in his life he was like, you know what, I'm

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Speaker 3: not gonna take place in a conversation with anyone unless

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Speaker 3: I initiated. So literally, people would come up and address

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Speaker 3: him and talk to him and he just wouldn't answer back.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, if they were really persistent, to be like, I

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Speaker 2: can't hear you.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 3: It's a very strange thing, but just sort of an

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Speaker 3: example of what an odd duck he was. A lot

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Speaker 3: of people did find him sort of creepy and off putting,

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Speaker 3: but he did have that charisma. You don't get cult

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Speaker 3: followers unless you're a charismatic dude, and he was that.

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Speaker 3: He you know, he had that jet black hair and sideburns.

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Speaker 3: He had a sort of elvas sea look. Yeah, we'll

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Speaker 3: put yep, which, by the way, is still a thing.

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Speaker 3: I went to Memphis, which is, you know, where my

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Speaker 3: mom grew up and where I used to go as

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Speaker 3: a child with my mom and Emily and Ruby, and

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Speaker 3: there are still those dudes walking around Memphis that are

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Speaker 3: like in their seventies now and have these big sideburns

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Speaker 3: and pompadors, like these sort of Memphis Mafia looking guys. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: it's really interesting. I was like, oh, wow, of course

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Speaker 3: Memphis still has those guys, for sure.

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Speaker 2: Where else are they going to go? What else are

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Speaker 2: they going to do? Nothing? That's what they do. That's

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Speaker 2: what you can do in Memphis.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. So, anyway, he was one of those guys you know,

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Speaker 1: later in life he was very well known for wearing

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Speaker 1: those steel rim sort of squarish I guess there were

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Speaker 1: sunglasses or were they also reading glasses.

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Speaker 2: I think they were like early transitions lenses. It looks

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Speaker 2: like almost they were just constantly in the in between state.

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Speaker 3: Well, listen, we could debate Jim Jones's eye diagnosis all

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Speaker 3: day long.

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Speaker 2: I'm guessing they were reading glasses. Because I've read an

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Speaker 2: account of him looking over them at in the room,

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Speaker 2: so it probably was reading glasses.

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Speaker 1: Which is also an intimidating move, I think for sure.

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Speaker 2: I get also the impression that he was wearing those

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Speaker 2: kind of in between sunglasses, because at some point in

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Speaker 2: the sixties he started taking drugs. Maybe even earlier than that,

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Speaker 2: but definitely by the sixties he was taking speed and

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Speaker 2: then later on like sedatives and co eludes and stuff,

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Speaker 2: and as the seventies started to wear on, he was

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Speaker 2: really getting into those. So he probably needed those glasses

300
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Speaker 2: on some days so that you couldn't see what his

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Speaker 2: eyes looked like in the middle of the afternoon.

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Speaker 1: You know, there's a lot of elvis in this story.

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Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, for sure.

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Speaker 1: Should we take a break?

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Speaker 2: For sure?

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Speaker 1: All right, We'll be right back, everybody, all right.

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Speaker 3: So Jim Jones has been sort of involved in several

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Speaker 3: different denominations and churches, worn out as welcome in most

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Speaker 3: of them, and eventually is like, you know what, I'm

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Speaker 3: going to start my own church, which is step one

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Speaker 3: if you're gonna form a cult. Actually that's not true.

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Speaker 3: There are plenty of cults without churches, but that was

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Speaker 3: his route and so he started the People's Temple in

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Speaker 3: nineteen fifty five and was really successful with it. He had,

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Speaker 3: you know, no trouble recruiting members, and by the early

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Speaker 3: nineteen sixties he was so popular and he had such

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Speaker 3: a following that he was able to continue his work

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Speaker 3: desegregating businesses and you know other you know, this wasn't

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Speaker 3: like a national movement. He kind of was one of

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Speaker 3: those think local guys. M And like you mentioned earlier,

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Speaker 3: in nineteen sixty, the mayor of Indianapolis said, all right,

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Speaker 3: you're the director of our Human Rights Commission, right, And like.

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Speaker 2: I said, he took that and ran with it and

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Speaker 2: started to really kind of rack up more and more interest.

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Speaker 2: And I'm not exactly clear on some of the document.

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Speaker 2: And you see about like his rise to power and influence.

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Speaker 2: The early stuff takes places in like a traditional church.

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Speaker 2: It looks like a church. You can tell it's a church.

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Speaker 2: It's just you know, what do they call it. I

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Speaker 2: guess charismatic churches where people are like dancing and everything

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Speaker 2: and clapping and he's healing people. I'm not sure at

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Speaker 2: what point it started. It could have been Indianapolis, it

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Speaker 2: probably was, but he started to just say more and

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Speaker 2: more like bizarre stuff over time. And one of the

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Speaker 2: first bizarre things that he said that had a really

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Speaker 2: big impact on the history of the People's Temple was

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Speaker 2: that there was going to be a thermonuclear war on

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Speaker 2: July fifteenth, nineteen sixty seven. The bombs were going to drop,

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Speaker 2: I think, is how he put it. And he apparently

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Speaker 2: got the six and the seven transposed, because what he

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Speaker 2: meant was July fifteenth, nineteen seventy six, the bomb was

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Speaker 2: going to drop. But he convinced his congregation, or a

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Speaker 2: lot of his congregation I think at least a hundred

344
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Speaker 2: families from Indianapolis to move to rural north northern California

345
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Speaker 2: to basically set up a safe haven, a little kind

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Speaker 2: of commune for the People's Temple. It was a It

347
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Speaker 2: was his first really truly big show of power over

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Speaker 2: other people's lives because just take just think about it

349
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Speaker 2: for a second. You go to church, right and you

350
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Speaker 2: go and you like listen to the sermon and everything,

351
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Speaker 2: and you have probably like some friends at church or whatever,

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Speaker 2: and then you come home and church is done for

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Speaker 2: the week. For a lot of people, maybe you go

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Speaker 2: one other day. That's about it. Imagine being so into

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Speaker 2: church that you move your family across the country because

356
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Speaker 2: your preacher is telling you there's going to be a

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Speaker 2: thermonuclear war and we all need to go to northern California.

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Speaker 2: That takes a real level of like intuitness that from congregants,

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Speaker 2: And it was a real show of like faith in

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Speaker 2: a test of faith for people, and he was very

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Speaker 2: successful with it. And I think that did nothing but

362
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Speaker 2: just embolden him further.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

364
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Speaker 3: Absolutely, And by this time we should point out too

365
00:20:11,440 --> 00:20:14,840
Speaker 3: that he had started quite a large family with Marceline

366
00:20:15,760 --> 00:20:18,399
Speaker 3: at her suggestion, and apparently he was super into it

367
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Speaker 3: as well. She wanted to have a rainbow family, so

368
00:20:22,040 --> 00:20:24,959
Speaker 3: they adopted quite a few kids of all different you know,

369
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Speaker 3: nationalities and ethnicities. They had one Native American child, they

370
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Speaker 3: adopted several Korean kids, a black child. I believe one

371
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Speaker 3: of his adopted daughters was killed by a drunk driver

372
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Speaker 3: in fifty nine, and then they adopted her younger sister,

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Speaker 3: which you know, is pretty amazing. And then they also

374
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Speaker 3: had their sole biological child in nineteen fifty nine, Stephan

375
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Speaker 3: Gandhi Jones, who you would if you look him up,

376
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Speaker 3: you will see lots of he's very active in his

377
00:21:01,240 --> 00:21:04,119
Speaker 3: you know, I was about to say his father's legacy today,

378
00:21:04,119 --> 00:21:07,199
Speaker 3: but you know, not obviously supporting his dad's legacy. But

379
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Speaker 3: like he you know, during the twenty eighteen commemoration of

380
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Speaker 3: the Jonestown massacre, I guess, is it a massacre or

381
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Speaker 3: just massive deaths?

382
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Speaker 1: What would you even call that?

383
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Speaker 2: It just depends on your perspective, But yeah, I think

384
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Speaker 2: you could get away calling it a massacre for sure.

385
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Speaker 3: Yeah, but he led that ceremony and also acknowledged that,

386
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Speaker 3: you know, hey, listen, it's a can of worms that

387
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Speaker 3: I'm doing this to begin with, and people have things

388
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Speaker 3: to say about me or don't agree with certain things

389
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Speaker 3: I say, then like let's please have that conversation.

390
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Speaker 1: But he's he's pretty vocal and public to this day.

391
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Speaker 2: Yeah, he wasn't just a kid at the time, like

392
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Speaker 2: toward the end of the People's Temple, he was the

393
00:21:47,080 --> 00:21:49,960
Speaker 2: head of the security force. Yeah, at the time when

394
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:53,760
Speaker 2: they were in Guyana, which we'll talk about soon. Yeah,

395
00:21:54,520 --> 00:21:57,920
Speaker 2: he's in a really strange way, very brave for like

396
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Speaker 2: showing his face in public as you know who he is.

397
00:22:02,440 --> 00:22:05,639
Speaker 3: Yeah, another interesting thing happened that's pretty key to the

398
00:22:05,680 --> 00:22:09,280
Speaker 3: story before he said, hey, everybody, let's move to California.

399
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Speaker 3: He moved his just his family to Rio dationan Aire,

400
00:22:13,840 --> 00:22:18,439
Speaker 3: Brazil because of this supposed impending nuclear disaster. And on

401
00:22:18,520 --> 00:22:20,600
Speaker 3: the way there, he stopped in a country in South

402
00:22:20,640 --> 00:22:24,879
Speaker 3: America called Guyana and just got a little taste of

403
00:22:24,880 --> 00:22:27,280
Speaker 3: what life was like there, and that definitely planted a seed.

404
00:22:27,440 --> 00:22:33,320
Speaker 3: So he's, I believe, in nineteen sixty four he's planning

405
00:22:33,359 --> 00:22:36,159
Speaker 3: this move a couple of hours north of San Francisco

406
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Speaker 3: to Yukia, California, and at that point he has already

407
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Speaker 3: at least visited and preached in Guyana.

408
00:22:43,640 --> 00:22:47,879
Speaker 2: Right, that's a great setup. So when he gets to Brazil,

409
00:22:48,000 --> 00:22:50,800
Speaker 2: he's basically like left and taken his family, like you said,

410
00:22:50,840 --> 00:22:53,000
Speaker 2: to get away from thermon nuclear war. But he's been like,

411
00:22:53,040 --> 00:22:56,040
Speaker 2: but you guys, you know, you stay back here and

412
00:22:57,200 --> 00:23:00,360
Speaker 2: keep the keep the temple going. Yeah, And apparently there

413
00:23:00,359 --> 00:23:03,560
Speaker 2: was no one there with his strength or charisma, because

414
00:23:04,640 --> 00:23:07,639
Speaker 2: the temple fell apart almost immediately, or it started to

415
00:23:07,720 --> 00:23:11,479
Speaker 2: it threatened to. So just after even a couple of months,

416
00:23:11,640 --> 00:23:13,800
Speaker 2: he had to go back and like get everything back

417
00:23:13,800 --> 00:23:17,320
Speaker 2: in line and back in order, and ended up staying there,

418
00:23:17,359 --> 00:23:21,639
Speaker 2: staying in California again for a while, I don't, I

419
00:23:21,640 --> 00:23:23,960
Speaker 2: guess for several more years, I think. Do you remember

420
00:23:24,000 --> 00:23:28,160
Speaker 2: when it was he moved to Brazil at first.

421
00:23:27,440 --> 00:23:29,879
Speaker 1: He moved to Brazil in nineteen sixty three.

422
00:23:30,119 --> 00:23:33,159
Speaker 2: Oh okay, so yeah, he came back. He came back

423
00:23:33,200 --> 00:23:35,200
Speaker 2: to Indianapolis, I guess is what it was. This would

424
00:23:35,240 --> 00:23:36,400
Speaker 2: have been pre California.

425
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Speaker 3: Yeah, And in California he found, you know, obviously northern California.

426
00:23:41,720 --> 00:23:44,480
Speaker 3: He would find in the nineteen sixties quite a few

427
00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:48,040
Speaker 3: people in that area that were into his message of socialism,

428
00:23:48,920 --> 00:23:52,000
Speaker 3: pretty ripe for recruiting. And he would eventually move into

429
00:23:52,000 --> 00:23:56,159
Speaker 3: San Francisco itself and did pretty well there, like so

430
00:23:56,320 --> 00:23:58,919
Speaker 3: well that he had a lot of followers who had

431
00:23:58,920 --> 00:24:00,720
Speaker 3: a lot of and had a lot of way or them.

432
00:24:01,080 --> 00:24:04,040
Speaker 3: So local politicians started saying, hey, we need to get

433
00:24:04,119 --> 00:24:06,000
Speaker 3: in line with this guy because he has a lot

434
00:24:06,040 --> 00:24:09,240
Speaker 3: of influence at the voting booth. Like Harvey Milk and

435
00:24:09,480 --> 00:24:14,080
Speaker 3: Mayor George Moscone were you know, like actively courting him.

436
00:24:14,080 --> 00:24:16,480
Speaker 3: I think they named him, or at least the mayor

437
00:24:16,560 --> 00:24:20,400
Speaker 3: named him chairman of the San Francisco's Housing Authority Commission.

438
00:24:20,680 --> 00:24:27,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, because he he basically took credit for Moscone's win

439
00:24:27,480 --> 00:24:31,960
Speaker 2: as mayor. He barely eked out a victory, and Jim

440
00:24:32,040 --> 00:24:35,760
Speaker 2: Jones had delivered several hundred, if not a couple thousand

441
00:24:35,840 --> 00:24:38,800
Speaker 2: votes toward toward Moscone, and he said, you owe me.

442
00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:42,680
Speaker 2: And he became the public housing director or a member

443
00:24:42,680 --> 00:24:46,240
Speaker 2: of the board, and apparently just to kind of show

444
00:24:46,320 --> 00:24:49,520
Speaker 2: his his influence in his cloud and how great he

445
00:24:49,680 --> 00:24:54,520
Speaker 2: was at those housing meetings, his followers would come, members

446
00:24:54,520 --> 00:24:57,399
Speaker 2: of the People's Temple would come and cheer him on

447
00:24:57,560 --> 00:24:59,840
Speaker 2: and clap an applaud sometimes give him a standing over

448
00:24:59,840 --> 00:25:02,679
Speaker 2: a when he would give a little speech about public

449
00:25:02,720 --> 00:25:07,440
Speaker 2: housing or something like that. Was really weird. But by

450
00:25:07,480 --> 00:25:11,679
Speaker 2: this time in San Francisco, late sixties, early seventies, like

451
00:25:12,040 --> 00:25:13,680
Speaker 2: people like that were a diamond dozen.

452
00:25:14,160 --> 00:25:15,160
Speaker 1: Yeah.

453
00:25:15,200 --> 00:25:19,040
Speaker 2: He was politically connected to people who are like this guy,

454
00:25:19,200 --> 00:25:22,680
Speaker 2: like you said, he can deliver the goods. Yeah, yeah,

455
00:25:22,760 --> 00:25:26,040
Speaker 2: so much so that whenever there was like unfavorable press

456
00:25:26,040 --> 00:25:27,720
Speaker 2: about him, and we'll talk about some of the stuff

457
00:25:27,720 --> 00:25:31,520
Speaker 2: they were writing about him in a second, he could

458
00:25:31,560 --> 00:25:34,080
Speaker 2: actually get it stifled. He had the connections to be like,

459
00:25:34,240 --> 00:25:35,840
Speaker 2: this article's going to come out on me, can you

460
00:25:35,880 --> 00:25:39,000
Speaker 2: make sure it doesn't come out, so he could stifle

461
00:25:39,160 --> 00:25:43,800
Speaker 2: like dissent and oppress any outsiders who were criticizing him.

462
00:25:44,280 --> 00:25:46,879
Speaker 2: So he was very powerful in San Francisco, and that

463
00:25:46,960 --> 00:25:49,200
Speaker 2: was actually the reason he moved everybody to San Francisco.

464
00:25:49,240 --> 00:25:53,240
Speaker 2: They went Indianapolis, to Yukaya, California, and northern California. He

465
00:25:53,280 --> 00:25:55,639
Speaker 2: figured out that was like Hicksville, USA, and he couldn't

466
00:25:55,880 --> 00:25:59,480
Speaker 2: actually develop any real power down there, so he moved

467
00:25:59,520 --> 00:26:01,879
Speaker 2: the whole thing to San Francisco, set up the People's

468
00:26:01,920 --> 00:26:06,000
Speaker 2: Temple in San Francisco, and essentially had what was a

469
00:26:08,840 --> 00:26:14,840
Speaker 2: Pentecostal black congregation that so emphasized civil rights that they

470
00:26:14,920 --> 00:26:20,600
Speaker 2: were just also bringing in tons of liberal, younger, middle

471
00:26:20,600 --> 00:26:23,159
Speaker 2: class white people too who wanted to support that cause,

472
00:26:23,240 --> 00:26:26,399
Speaker 2: who might have never been in a Pentecostal service in

473
00:26:26,480 --> 00:26:28,119
Speaker 2: their life, and now all of a sudden, they're like

474
00:26:28,160 --> 00:26:31,120
Speaker 2: singing and clapping and dancing. So he had all these

475
00:26:31,119 --> 00:26:33,720
Speaker 2: different streams of people that he was just bringing in,

476
00:26:34,040 --> 00:26:39,280
Speaker 2: bringing in, and eventually trapping in his church, the People's Temple.

477
00:26:40,040 --> 00:26:42,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's like, I love the grateful dead, but I've

478
00:26:42,720 --> 00:26:48,240
Speaker 3: never handled a rattlesnake. This is amazing exactly so things

479
00:26:48,240 --> 00:26:50,760
Speaker 3: are also you know, as this is going along, things

480
00:26:50,760 --> 00:26:53,320
Speaker 3: are just becoming more and more culty. It was sort

481
00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:56,960
Speaker 3: of a slow burn toward you know, fully fledged cult.

482
00:26:57,640 --> 00:27:00,560
Speaker 1: But by this time he was, you know, right out

483
00:27:00,600 --> 00:27:01,160
Speaker 1: of the playbook.

484
00:27:01,200 --> 00:27:01,480
Speaker 2: He was.

485
00:27:01,560 --> 00:27:03,680
Speaker 3: And we have a you know a lot of cult

486
00:27:04,560 --> 00:27:08,560
Speaker 3: content in our history, one on cults, one on deprogramming.

487
00:27:09,520 --> 00:27:11,320
Speaker 1: I think we cover some other cults as well.

488
00:27:12,320 --> 00:27:16,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, specifically have surely, but I into mind.

489
00:27:16,720 --> 00:27:20,600
Speaker 3: I mean Manson of course. Oh, but he is right

490
00:27:20,640 --> 00:27:23,120
Speaker 3: out of the cult leader playbook. He's starting to isolate

491
00:27:23,160 --> 00:27:27,399
Speaker 3: members from friends and family. He's starting to say, you know,

492
00:27:27,480 --> 00:27:29,360
Speaker 3: when you join my church, you got to turn over

493
00:27:29,440 --> 00:27:32,919
Speaker 3: all your possessions to us. They ended up having a

494
00:27:32,960 --> 00:27:35,000
Speaker 3: lot of money. I saw one point towards the end

495
00:27:35,000 --> 00:27:36,960
Speaker 3: they had like eleven million bucks in a bank account.

496
00:27:37,040 --> 00:27:39,399
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's like nineteen seventy eight money.

497
00:27:39,200 --> 00:27:40,600
Speaker 1: Right, Yeah, totally.

498
00:27:41,119 --> 00:27:43,760
Speaker 3: And he started, you know, doing that thing where you're saying,

499
00:27:43,800 --> 00:27:46,120
Speaker 3: you know, outside people are going to want to pull

500
00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:47,960
Speaker 3: you out of here, they're going to want you to defect.

501
00:27:48,240 --> 00:27:51,720
Speaker 3: Your family might even he would spread lies about them.

502
00:27:51,760 --> 00:27:55,320
Speaker 3: He would say he's getting prophecies that if you disobeyed

503
00:27:55,359 --> 00:27:57,639
Speaker 3: and tried to defect, then you would suffer some kind

504
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:00,600
Speaker 3: of tragedy. So things are getting more and more and

505
00:28:00,640 --> 00:28:05,640
Speaker 3: that's when, like you said, he started getting some press coverage,

506
00:28:05,640 --> 00:28:08,400
Speaker 3: which I mean, what's really like one of the most

507
00:28:08,440 --> 00:28:11,080
Speaker 3: astounding things about all this is so many cults you

508
00:28:11,119 --> 00:28:14,400
Speaker 3: hear about after the fact, but this was actively going

509
00:28:14,440 --> 00:28:17,680
Speaker 3: on and being reported on by the press like while

510
00:28:17,680 --> 00:28:18,400
Speaker 3: it was happening.

511
00:28:18,600 --> 00:28:22,280
Speaker 2: Yeah, because he was getting like wild and bizarre and

512
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:26,680
Speaker 2: abusive enough toward his congregation that there were defectors. There

513
00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:29,200
Speaker 2: were people who are like the what is this, I'm

514
00:28:29,240 --> 00:28:31,480
Speaker 2: getting out of here, and they would go start to

515
00:28:31,520 --> 00:28:34,560
Speaker 2: talk publicly about this. But yeah, he had enough clout

516
00:28:34,600 --> 00:28:40,240
Speaker 2: to like get any real, real unfavorable coverage or any

517
00:28:40,280 --> 00:28:44,960
Speaker 2: widespread unfavorable coverage stamped out. But one of the things

518
00:28:44,960 --> 00:28:48,000
Speaker 2: you mentioned that I think he really started to ratchet

519
00:28:48,040 --> 00:28:53,000
Speaker 2: up around this time was isolating his congregation by creating

520
00:28:53,240 --> 00:28:57,480
Speaker 2: US versus them mentality, Yeah, and creating a siege mentality

521
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:01,479
Speaker 2: among the people who remember of the People's Temple, especially

522
00:29:01,560 --> 00:29:06,440
Speaker 2: the hardest core members, that the US government wanted them

523
00:29:07,040 --> 00:29:09,840
Speaker 2: shut down. People were spreading lies about them, Like if

524
00:29:09,880 --> 00:29:12,520
Speaker 2: an article did get out, he could point to how

525
00:29:12,560 --> 00:29:16,040
Speaker 2: this is like lies and propaganda against the People's Temple

526
00:29:16,360 --> 00:29:18,840
Speaker 2: and use it as evidence about how there really was

527
00:29:18,840 --> 00:29:21,160
Speaker 2: was a siege and at some point the People's Temple

528
00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:24,320
Speaker 2: in San Francisco actually burned down. I saw that they

529
00:29:24,360 --> 00:29:27,400
Speaker 2: think it was white supremacists. Jim Jones blamed it on

530
00:29:27,480 --> 00:29:30,640
Speaker 2: the Nation of Islam. Somebody burned the temple down, and

531
00:29:30,720 --> 00:29:35,120
Speaker 2: all that did was fee that paranoid sensibility that just

532
00:29:35,280 --> 00:29:39,120
Speaker 2: isolated the members of the People's Temple even further and

533
00:29:39,200 --> 00:29:42,320
Speaker 2: pushed them even closer toward Jim Jones, who just used

534
00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:44,600
Speaker 2: stuff like that to his advantage at every turn.

535
00:29:45,400 --> 00:29:49,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, he was also like things got a little more

536
00:29:50,240 --> 00:29:51,640
Speaker 3: violent and militaristic.

537
00:29:52,440 --> 00:29:52,720
Speaker 1: You know.

538
00:29:53,240 --> 00:29:56,840
Speaker 3: He got his inner most circle together and named them

539
00:29:56,920 --> 00:29:59,920
Speaker 3: the Planning Commission. They were his sort of in turn

540
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 3: old security team and things. You know, he would start saying, Okay,

541
00:30:05,880 --> 00:30:08,640
Speaker 3: you congregants have to have sex with each other. You

542
00:30:08,760 --> 00:30:12,720
Speaker 3: congregants are getting married to one another. There were starvation

543
00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:14,840
Speaker 3: diets that was forced to labor.

544
00:30:15,520 --> 00:30:16,040
Speaker 1: Sometimes.

545
00:30:16,520 --> 00:30:18,720
Speaker 3: You know, if a congregation member stepped out of line,

546
00:30:18,760 --> 00:30:21,680
Speaker 3: they might be stripped and marched around in front of

547
00:30:21,680 --> 00:30:26,000
Speaker 3: the other temple members. So things are full on swinging

548
00:30:26,200 --> 00:30:29,720
Speaker 3: cults at this point when he is being written about

549
00:30:29,760 --> 00:30:31,160
Speaker 3: in the press and like you said, getting most of

550
00:30:31,200 --> 00:30:34,440
Speaker 3: it stamped out. But something happened in nineteen seventy three

551
00:30:34,520 --> 00:30:37,200
Speaker 3: that like where the walls really started to close in

552
00:30:37,240 --> 00:30:41,560
Speaker 3: on them, and that was a I mean, I guess

553
00:30:41,560 --> 00:30:46,400
Speaker 3: sort of a sting operation. He was bisexual, that was

554
00:30:46,440 --> 00:30:50,040
Speaker 3: not out, and in fact, later on in like sort

555
00:30:50,040 --> 00:30:52,600
Speaker 3: of the the not the last days, but sort of

556
00:30:52,760 --> 00:30:55,600
Speaker 3: while he was in Guyana and living there, which we'll

557
00:30:55,640 --> 00:31:00,280
Speaker 3: get to, he told all the congregation, you're all homosexual,

558
00:31:00,520 --> 00:31:02,320
Speaker 3: and I'm the only heterosexual here.

559
00:31:03,160 --> 00:31:04,600
Speaker 1: So he made a big deal about that.

560
00:31:04,720 --> 00:31:09,120
Speaker 3: But he was definitely bisexual because he would abuse both

561
00:31:09,640 --> 00:31:13,720
Speaker 3: men and women within the temple, some accusations that they

562
00:31:13,720 --> 00:31:16,920
Speaker 3: were under age, of course. And in late nineteen seventy three,

563
00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:20,440
Speaker 3: in December, he was at a movie theater in Los

564
00:31:20,480 --> 00:31:26,000
Speaker 3: Angeles and an undercover cop I read the police report,

565
00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:30,280
Speaker 3: apparently Jones signaled to him like, hey, meet me up

566
00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:33,360
Speaker 3: in the balcony, and the cop instead went to the

567
00:31:33,400 --> 00:31:35,880
Speaker 3: bathroom and motioned for him to come in there. And

568
00:31:35,920 --> 00:31:39,560
Speaker 3: when he got to the bathroom, Jim Jones pulled his

569
00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:43,080
Speaker 3: pants down and started to masturbate in front of him.

570
00:31:43,680 --> 00:31:46,680
Speaker 3: The cop left and had his partner come in there

571
00:31:46,680 --> 00:31:49,240
Speaker 3: and arrest him, and he got out of it.

572
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:54,360
Speaker 2: He apparently I didn't see this anywhere, but Ed said

573
00:31:54,360 --> 00:31:57,800
Speaker 2: that he found that his defense was that he was

574
00:31:57,920 --> 00:32:02,520
Speaker 2: jumping up and down massaging his prostate, which was hurting

575
00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:03,240
Speaker 2: him at the time.

576
00:32:04,000 --> 00:32:06,040
Speaker 1: Yeah, he had a doctor's letter, dude.

577
00:32:06,160 --> 00:32:10,520
Speaker 2: I also saw that he just he uses political connections

578
00:32:10,520 --> 00:32:11,320
Speaker 2: to get him out of it.

579
00:32:12,120 --> 00:32:16,480
Speaker 3: Well, it's hard to tell what happened because the judge

580
00:32:16,720 --> 00:32:18,880
Speaker 3: and I don't know, this seems weird. Maybe that kind

581
00:32:18,880 --> 00:32:22,200
Speaker 3: of thing happened a lot though. The judge ordered the

582
00:32:22,520 --> 00:32:26,960
Speaker 3: arrest records destroyed and then the file was sealed, So

583
00:32:27,320 --> 00:32:29,120
Speaker 3: I don't think a lot of people really know exactly

584
00:32:29,160 --> 00:32:32,360
Speaker 3: why he was released. But he had a doctor's note,

585
00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:35,240
Speaker 3: and the doctor went to bat for him and said, yeah,

586
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:37,840
Speaker 3: I mean, this is what it might look like when

587
00:32:37,880 --> 00:32:41,200
Speaker 3: he's trying to work up a urination in the bathroom.

588
00:32:41,360 --> 00:32:44,520
Speaker 2: Right, just really just stay with me here, it said

589
00:32:44,560 --> 00:32:45,080
Speaker 2: in the note.

590
00:32:45,160 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 1: Right.

591
00:32:46,880 --> 00:32:48,960
Speaker 2: So that was a big turning point, Like you said,

592
00:32:48,960 --> 00:32:52,880
Speaker 2: that was December of nineteen seventy three, and Jim Jones

593
00:32:52,880 --> 00:32:57,160
Speaker 2: started to get the message that the direction he was

594
00:32:57,160 --> 00:33:02,720
Speaker 2: taking his congregation in was too bizarre for San Francisco,

595
00:33:03,120 --> 00:33:06,520
Speaker 2: maybe even too bizarre for the United States. And he

596
00:33:06,600 --> 00:33:11,120
Speaker 2: remembered Guyana at the time and sent some people down

597
00:33:11,160 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 2: there to start scouting out and setting up a compound,

598
00:33:15,360 --> 00:33:18,880
Speaker 2: a place, I guess, an additional place for the People's

599
00:33:18,920 --> 00:33:23,400
Speaker 2: Temple outside of the oversight of the United States government

600
00:33:23,440 --> 00:33:27,440
Speaker 2: and the United States press and all that. And while

601
00:33:27,480 --> 00:33:30,480
Speaker 2: they were off doing that, there was something he did

602
00:33:30,520 --> 00:33:36,240
Speaker 2: back in San Francisco that was enormously important, and I say,

603
00:33:36,320 --> 00:33:37,800
Speaker 2: maybe we take a break and we'll come back and

604
00:33:37,800 --> 00:33:38,440
Speaker 2: talk about.

605
00:33:38,240 --> 00:33:42,480
Speaker 3: It our first cliffhanger of the year. That's right, we'll

606
00:33:42,480 --> 00:33:43,040
Speaker 3: be right back.

607
00:34:07,600 --> 00:34:12,360
Speaker 2: So nineteen seventy four he's sent some people down to Guyana, Guyana,

608
00:34:12,440 --> 00:34:15,800
Speaker 2: to start setting up a new compound for the People's

609
00:34:15,840 --> 00:34:16,600
Speaker 2: Temple down there.

610
00:34:17,160 --> 00:34:19,440
Speaker 1: Socialist country, by the way, at the time.

611
00:34:19,400 --> 00:34:23,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, which makes sense because by this time Jim Jones

612
00:34:23,120 --> 00:34:27,000
Speaker 2: has been identifying himself to his congregation as their socialist God.

613
00:34:27,760 --> 00:34:31,600
Speaker 2: Over time, he slowly stripped away the concept that Jesus

614
00:34:31,719 --> 00:34:34,960
Speaker 2: is God or that he was Jesus, and replaced himself

615
00:34:34,960 --> 00:34:38,279
Speaker 2: to his followers as God. Like they started towards the end,

616
00:34:38,440 --> 00:34:41,640
Speaker 2: following him as God, they called him Father, They called

617
00:34:41,680 --> 00:34:47,200
Speaker 2: him Dad. He was very much like their religious figure

618
00:34:47,320 --> 00:34:50,640
Speaker 2: on earth, way more than just their reverend or their

619
00:34:50,680 --> 00:34:53,160
Speaker 2: pastor or even the head of their cult. Like he

620
00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:59,239
Speaker 2: was a supernatural religious figure in the most ardent of believer's.

621
00:34:58,760 --> 00:35:01,520
Speaker 1: Eyes, Elvis exactly.

622
00:35:02,480 --> 00:35:05,799
Speaker 2: So he tries something with him that proved to be

623
00:35:05,880 --> 00:35:09,360
Speaker 2: the first of a couple of attempts, or a couple

624
00:35:09,400 --> 00:35:13,600
Speaker 2: of practice runs for what happened in Guyana in San Francisco.

625
00:35:13,640 --> 00:35:17,040
Speaker 2: At the People's Temple, he handed out cups and he said, Hey,

626
00:35:17,080 --> 00:35:22,160
Speaker 2: I know we all steer clear of alcohol me, but

627
00:35:23,760 --> 00:35:26,120
Speaker 2: one of our vineyards has produced a really great wine

628
00:35:26,120 --> 00:35:28,440
Speaker 2: and I want everybody to try it. So he passed

629
00:35:28,440 --> 00:35:32,239
Speaker 2: out cups, made sure everybody tried the wine. He circulated

630
00:35:32,360 --> 00:35:34,799
Speaker 2: among everyone as they were drinking it, and then after

631
00:35:34,840 --> 00:35:37,920
Speaker 2: everyone had finished, he went back to the polepit and

632
00:35:37,960 --> 00:35:42,080
Speaker 2: he said that was poisoned. You're all going to die

633
00:35:42,120 --> 00:35:44,239
Speaker 2: in about the next ten minutes or something. We're all

634
00:35:44,280 --> 00:35:47,799
Speaker 2: going to die together. And he gauged their reaction, and

635
00:35:47,880 --> 00:35:52,440
Speaker 2: apparently the reaction was a combination between stunned silence and

636
00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:57,959
Speaker 2: acquiescence like okay that there wasn't people screaming, people weren't

637
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:01,000
Speaker 2: running for the doors, nobody tried to beat him up

638
00:36:01,200 --> 00:36:06,239
Speaker 2: or kill him. That was just he saw they would

639
00:36:06,280 --> 00:36:08,680
Speaker 2: actually do this, like I think if I actually asked

640
00:36:08,719 --> 00:36:10,640
Speaker 2: them to do it and didn't just trick them into it.

641
00:36:11,239 --> 00:36:13,560
Speaker 2: And he said, I'm this is all just a test

642
00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:16,160
Speaker 2: of your loyalty. You all passed way to go. But

643
00:36:16,239 --> 00:36:18,319
Speaker 2: that was not the only time that he did that

644
00:36:18,360 --> 00:36:19,400
Speaker 2: to those poor people.

645
00:36:20,760 --> 00:36:23,440
Speaker 3: Yeah, he started, Well, let's back up a set, because

646
00:36:23,800 --> 00:36:28,040
Speaker 3: in seventy four is when about fifty temple members went

647
00:36:28,080 --> 00:36:30,719
Speaker 3: to Guyana to start setting it up. And they did

648
00:36:30,719 --> 00:36:34,239
Speaker 3: that for about three years, and a magazine article came

649
00:36:34,280 --> 00:36:36,680
Speaker 3: out in New West magazine in nineteen seventy seven that

650
00:36:36,760 --> 00:36:41,440
Speaker 3: really exposed him for what he was and he was like, okay,

651
00:36:41,640 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 3: like the jig is up, I have to get out

652
00:36:44,160 --> 00:36:48,600
Speaker 3: of here now. So he moved with his family to

653
00:36:48,719 --> 00:36:52,319
Speaker 3: Guyana and apparently the facilities could only support about two

654
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:56,320
Speaker 3: hundred people. In May of seventy seven, six hundred more came,

655
00:36:56,760 --> 00:36:59,399
Speaker 3: and then the ensuing months, another four hundred people came.

656
00:37:00,040 --> 00:37:01,319
Speaker 1: A lot of these were kids.

657
00:37:01,480 --> 00:37:05,000
Speaker 3: A lot of these people were elderly, or infirmed, and

658
00:37:05,040 --> 00:37:08,800
Speaker 3: so there weren't enough people there to work and sustain it. Really,

659
00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:11,680
Speaker 3: they worked twelve hours a day. The people that could work,

660
00:37:12,120 --> 00:37:14,880
Speaker 3: it was brutal. When they weren't working, they were listening

661
00:37:14,880 --> 00:37:17,800
Speaker 3: to his sermons and his lectures, they were watching Russian

662
00:37:17,920 --> 00:37:23,399
Speaker 3: communist propaganda films, and abuse allegations started to come out,

663
00:37:23,640 --> 00:37:26,800
Speaker 3: and he got super paranoid, and that's when he started

664
00:37:26,880 --> 00:37:29,640
Speaker 3: leading more and more of those dry runs. He called

665
00:37:29,680 --> 00:37:32,520
Speaker 3: them white Knights, where he would have these trial runs

666
00:37:32,560 --> 00:37:36,160
Speaker 3: for mass suicide. Sometimes they would meet in the pavilion

667
00:37:36,440 --> 00:37:40,239
Speaker 3: and his security team would like fire guns from the

668
00:37:40,320 --> 00:37:44,480
Speaker 3: jungle over their heads. One of them lasted for six days.

669
00:37:44,480 --> 00:37:47,040
Speaker 3: It was called the six day Siege. And they were

670
00:37:47,080 --> 00:37:50,040
Speaker 3: just all these dry runs for killing themselves. And I

671
00:37:50,080 --> 00:37:52,080
Speaker 3: think they just routinely got used to it.

672
00:37:52,640 --> 00:37:56,239
Speaker 2: Yeah, but every time it was just a test of

673
00:37:56,280 --> 00:37:59,560
Speaker 2: their loyalty. It was a drill to practice for when

674
00:37:59,600 --> 00:38:04,239
Speaker 2: the United States military inevitably invaded, because that siege mentality

675
00:38:04,280 --> 00:38:07,640
Speaker 2: had gotten even more paranoid. Apparently he was just off

676
00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:12,520
Speaker 2: his rocker on speed. Would give hours and hours and

677
00:38:12,640 --> 00:38:16,520
Speaker 2: hours long marathon sermons into the night. And you mentioned

678
00:38:16,560 --> 00:38:22,120
Speaker 2: that the bulk of the building of Jonestown fell on

679
00:38:22,160 --> 00:38:25,680
Speaker 2: the shoulders of like a not like a minority, but

680
00:38:26,280 --> 00:38:29,440
Speaker 2: far fewer people than there were to support. So those

681
00:38:29,440 --> 00:38:36,560
Speaker 2: people were working day and night and eating black black

682
00:38:36,600 --> 00:38:42,759
Speaker 2: eyed peas and rice and bananas, and it is nice,

683
00:38:42,760 --> 00:38:45,480
Speaker 2: but if that's all you're eating, and you're working hard

684
00:38:45,560 --> 00:38:48,480
Speaker 2: labor hours and hours a day, and then when you

685
00:38:48,520 --> 00:38:51,720
Speaker 2: get off of hard labor, you go sit and listen

686
00:38:51,719 --> 00:38:55,200
Speaker 2: to an hour's long sermon till two am or three am.

687
00:38:55,320 --> 00:38:56,879
Speaker 2: Then you have to get up at five or six

688
00:38:56,960 --> 00:38:59,600
Speaker 2: the next morning and start all over again. Even the

689
00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:02,680
Speaker 2: people who who were at Jonestown, who weren't like I

690
00:39:02,680 --> 00:39:06,360
Speaker 2: would kill myself for Jim Jones believers were too tired

691
00:39:06,480 --> 00:39:09,520
Speaker 2: and sleep deprived to give any kind of problems to

692
00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:12,520
Speaker 2: Jim Jones in the direction he was taking everybody. So

693
00:39:12,600 --> 00:39:15,759
Speaker 2: that was actually like part of the plan apparently, or

694
00:39:15,800 --> 00:39:18,000
Speaker 2: at the very least it was a happy byproduct for

695
00:39:18,160 --> 00:39:21,920
Speaker 2: Jim Jones that the people were either totally committed to

696
00:39:22,000 --> 00:39:27,600
Speaker 2: him or they were so overworked and underslept that they

697
00:39:27,640 --> 00:39:29,360
Speaker 2: just couldn't put up any kind of protest.

698
00:39:30,000 --> 00:39:36,640
Speaker 3: Yeah, for sure. So things are happening in Guyana at Jonestown. Finally,

699
00:39:36,840 --> 00:39:39,160
Speaker 3: a you know press is still writing about this stuff

700
00:39:39,160 --> 00:39:41,879
Speaker 3: back in the States, and in late nineteen seventy eight,

701
00:39:42,640 --> 00:39:45,760
Speaker 3: a California Congressman named Leo Ryan, who had been following

702
00:39:45,800 --> 00:39:49,360
Speaker 3: this story, and this is one of the more remarkable

703
00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:53,360
Speaker 3: parts of this whole story. A congressman flew to Guyana

704
00:39:53,520 --> 00:39:57,160
Speaker 3: with a small group like some NBC camera people and

705
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:00,880
Speaker 3: reporters and journalists and stuff on a fact finding mission.

706
00:40:01,600 --> 00:40:04,279
Speaker 3: They actually went to the camp at Jonestown and met

707
00:40:04,280 --> 00:40:08,200
Speaker 3: in the pavilion. While they were there, a temple member

708
00:40:08,280 --> 00:40:12,279
Speaker 3: named Vernon Gosni passed a note to a reporter that

709
00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:14,920
Speaker 3: was meant for Leo Ryan that said, please help me

710
00:40:15,120 --> 00:40:19,960
Speaker 3: and my wife leave. They got out of there and

711
00:40:20,120 --> 00:40:23,040
Speaker 3: took fifteen temple members that were defecting with them, and

712
00:40:23,440 --> 00:40:25,799
Speaker 3: Jim Jones was like, they can go. It's fine. People

713
00:40:25,840 --> 00:40:27,920
Speaker 3: are free to go if they want to. There was

714
00:40:27,920 --> 00:40:30,799
Speaker 3: some brief incident with Ryan where he was held at

715
00:40:30,880 --> 00:40:33,719
Speaker 3: nine point or there was an attempted stabbing. Things got

716
00:40:33,800 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 3: pretty chaotic and they got the heck out of there

717
00:40:36,480 --> 00:40:38,880
Speaker 3: and went to this airstrip. While they were waiting on

718
00:40:38,920 --> 00:40:42,800
Speaker 3: their couple of planes to get ready, and the Red Brigade,

719
00:40:42,920 --> 00:40:45,600
Speaker 3: which was the new name of his security team by

720
00:40:45,600 --> 00:40:49,600
Speaker 3: this point, who were really really militaristic this point, showed

721
00:40:49,680 --> 00:40:52,359
Speaker 3: up at the airfield and just opened fire on him.

722
00:40:53,000 --> 00:40:55,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, and just to kind of rewind for one second,

723
00:40:56,280 --> 00:40:58,719
Speaker 2: when Leo Ryan showed up, he was showing up to

724
00:40:58,800 --> 00:41:01,600
Speaker 2: investigate this cult that he'd heard nothing about, bad things about.

725
00:41:02,200 --> 00:41:05,680
Speaker 2: But his reception and like the banquet that was thrown

726
00:41:05,760 --> 00:41:08,120
Speaker 2: for him and the music that was played in the

727
00:41:08,800 --> 00:41:15,319
Speaker 2: services that he witnessed were so enthusiastic and upbeat that

728
00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:18,960
Speaker 2: he actually gave a speech to them saying like, it's

729
00:41:19,080 --> 00:41:21,719
Speaker 2: very clear that for most of you, this is the

730
00:41:21,760 --> 00:41:24,120
Speaker 2: greatest thing that's ever happened to you. And the place

731
00:41:24,200 --> 00:41:28,520
Speaker 2: just erupts and like cheers. They've like won this guy over,

732
00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:31,400
Speaker 2: like maybe they'll be left alone from now on, And

733
00:41:31,680 --> 00:41:35,040
Speaker 2: it was like a jubilant You can tell Congressman Ryan

734
00:41:35,160 --> 00:41:37,160
Speaker 2: is like into it too, He's like, this is great.

735
00:41:38,280 --> 00:41:41,320
Speaker 2: And it goes from that to all of a sudden,

736
00:41:41,360 --> 00:41:43,960
Speaker 2: the truth of the matter is just kind of exposed,

737
00:41:44,000 --> 00:41:46,759
Speaker 2: like a little rotten core of an apple that you

738
00:41:46,800 --> 00:41:49,640
Speaker 2: thought was just totally bright and shiny, and it must

739
00:41:49,640 --> 00:41:54,200
Speaker 2: have been stomach turning to have your perceptions just turned

740
00:41:54,640 --> 00:41:58,640
Speaker 2: on end like that. When that note was handed to

741
00:41:58,680 --> 00:42:02,280
Speaker 2: that cameraman Leo O. Ryan was like, oh, these people

742
00:42:02,400 --> 00:42:05,759
Speaker 2: are totally brainwashed, and I was almost duped, and then

743
00:42:05,800 --> 00:42:08,239
Speaker 2: it became tense. Then he was held at nine point

744
00:42:08,440 --> 00:42:12,040
Speaker 2: and then he ended up dying on the airstrip.

745
00:42:12,640 --> 00:42:14,960
Speaker 1: Yeah. Actually we did one on brainwashing too.

746
00:42:15,239 --> 00:42:17,600
Speaker 2: We totally did. We also did one on roundabouts people

747
00:42:17,640 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 2: who like roundabouts.

748
00:42:20,960 --> 00:42:25,040
Speaker 3: So remarkably part of this exists on film. The NBC

749
00:42:25,080 --> 00:42:27,799
Speaker 3: camera person Bob Brown was filming some b roll there

750
00:42:28,320 --> 00:42:33,880
Speaker 3: when this shootout breaks out, and it wasn't much because

751
00:42:33,920 --> 00:42:36,600
Speaker 3: he actually was shot and killed and his camera was

752
00:42:36,680 --> 00:42:39,000
Speaker 3: shot up as well, so he only had a few

753
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:44,120
Speaker 3: seconds of this attack. But Ryan was killed, that cameraman

754
00:42:44,200 --> 00:42:47,560
Speaker 3: Bob Brown was killed, NBC reporter Don Harris was killed.

755
00:42:47,960 --> 00:42:50,640
Speaker 3: There was a photographer from the Examiner in San Francisco

756
00:42:50,719 --> 00:42:54,160
Speaker 3: named Greg Robinson that was killed, and one of the defectors,

757
00:42:54,560 --> 00:42:58,239
Speaker 3: Patricia Parks, was killed. And in the second airplane, this

758
00:42:58,280 --> 00:43:00,399
Speaker 3: was a little cessna, so there weren't even that many

759
00:43:00,400 --> 00:43:03,480
Speaker 3: people on it. There was a defector there that was,

760
00:43:04,239 --> 00:43:07,080
Speaker 3: you know, pretending to defect, pulls out a gun inside

761
00:43:07,120 --> 00:43:10,320
Speaker 3: that tiny plane and opens fire somehow doesn't kill anyone,

762
00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:13,440
Speaker 3: he wounds three of them, and the people that survive

763
00:43:13,640 --> 00:43:16,799
Speaker 3: like just you know, booked it into the jungle, and

764
00:43:17,000 --> 00:43:19,600
Speaker 3: it is I mean, this is the beginning of a

765
00:43:19,719 --> 00:43:20,440
Speaker 3: very quick end.

766
00:43:20,600 --> 00:43:22,680
Speaker 2: Yeah. Two of the people who were attacked on the

767
00:43:22,719 --> 00:43:26,000
Speaker 2: airstrip survived by pretending they were dead. Jackie Spear, who

768
00:43:26,040 --> 00:43:29,200
Speaker 2: was Leo Ryan's assistant, and Steve Sung, who was a

769
00:43:29,239 --> 00:43:32,520
Speaker 2: sound guy. I think for NBC, they pretended they were dead,

770
00:43:32,600 --> 00:43:35,480
Speaker 2: and I think Jackie Spear said she was shot point blank,

771
00:43:35,920 --> 00:43:37,600
Speaker 2: like they came up to make sure she was dead

772
00:43:37,680 --> 00:43:42,640
Speaker 2: and didn't manage to kill her. I read, Chuck, this

773
00:43:42,719 --> 00:43:46,239
Speaker 2: is really important. I read that they laid there that

774
00:43:46,320 --> 00:43:50,240
Speaker 2: Jackie Spear reported laying there for twenty two hours before

775
00:43:50,360 --> 00:43:53,239
Speaker 2: help came. Okay, so she's laying there pretending she's dead

776
00:43:53,239 --> 00:43:57,279
Speaker 2: on the tarmac for twenty two hours and just put

777
00:43:57,320 --> 00:44:02,239
Speaker 2: that in your bonnet and save it for like, yeah, absolutely,

778
00:44:02,320 --> 00:44:05,200
Speaker 2: twenty two hours after the attack, helped finally came for

779
00:44:05,320 --> 00:44:06,399
Speaker 2: Jackie Spears.

780
00:44:06,680 --> 00:44:07,359
Speaker 1: Yeah.

781
00:44:07,400 --> 00:44:11,600
Speaker 3: Back at the temple, Jim Jones, he knows this is it.

782
00:44:11,680 --> 00:44:15,080
Speaker 3: Like the walls have fully closed in, they've committed multiple

783
00:44:15,160 --> 00:44:18,200
Speaker 3: murders here, and he knows there's no way out, so

784
00:44:18,719 --> 00:44:21,160
Speaker 3: he's like, the military is going to be coming for us,

785
00:44:21,400 --> 00:44:26,400
Speaker 3: the US military. Revolutionary suicide is the only way out.

786
00:44:27,080 --> 00:44:32,520
Speaker 3: And there is a recording that's very disturbing, I mean,

787
00:44:32,560 --> 00:44:33,520
Speaker 3: big trigger warnings.

788
00:44:33,520 --> 00:44:35,160
Speaker 1: I'm not going to get too involved in it.

789
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:38,160
Speaker 3: It's called the Death Tape, but you can listen to

790
00:44:38,680 --> 00:44:44,360
Speaker 3: the revolutionary suicide process unfold on this tape.

791
00:44:45,400 --> 00:44:46,160
Speaker 1: Did you listen to it?

792
00:44:46,239 --> 00:44:47,279
Speaker 2: Yeah? I listened to the whole thing.

793
00:44:48,360 --> 00:44:48,879
Speaker 1: I had to.

794
00:44:48,800 --> 00:44:51,200
Speaker 3: Scrub through some of it because it's really hard to

795
00:44:51,239 --> 00:44:55,480
Speaker 3: listen to. There are parts where people are standing up

796
00:44:55,560 --> 00:44:58,440
Speaker 3: and saying, no, this is not what we want. There

797
00:44:58,480 --> 00:45:02,920
Speaker 3: are people that are just unsure. There are and this

798
00:45:03,040 --> 00:45:06,719
Speaker 3: is very triggering, obviously, but there were the sounds of

799
00:45:07,200 --> 00:45:10,160
Speaker 3: children crying all over the place in the background, and

800
00:45:10,239 --> 00:45:13,759
Speaker 3: a woman saying they're not in pain, it's just a

801
00:45:13,800 --> 00:45:16,319
Speaker 3: bitter taste in their mouth, that no one's feeling any pain.

802
00:45:17,080 --> 00:45:18,560
Speaker 1: And it's just.

803
00:45:18,160 --> 00:45:23,160
Speaker 3: Incredibly disturbing and remarkable that this exists in the world

804
00:45:23,200 --> 00:45:25,920
Speaker 3: and that you can listen to this. But then you know,

805
00:45:25,960 --> 00:45:28,200
Speaker 3: at like the forty two minute mark, it just goes

806
00:45:28,360 --> 00:45:29,880
Speaker 3: quiet and it's haunting.

807
00:45:30,200 --> 00:45:33,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think from what I understand, it's really easy

808
00:45:33,560 --> 00:45:35,399
Speaker 2: to take it like that's the end of Jones Town.

809
00:45:35,880 --> 00:45:40,360
Speaker 2: But I believe what the death tape covers is the

810
00:45:41,280 --> 00:45:45,240
Speaker 2: beginning of the whole thing. Yeah, the killing of the children.

811
00:45:45,280 --> 00:45:47,520
Speaker 2: That's why you're hearing the children screaming. They're dying from

812
00:45:48,120 --> 00:45:53,160
Speaker 2: being forced to drink cyanide, and they as it gets quiet,

813
00:45:53,160 --> 00:45:56,839
Speaker 2: that's because the kids have died. It's just as eerie.

814
00:45:56,880 --> 00:45:59,720
Speaker 2: That doesn't make it any less eerie. But apparently after

815
00:45:59,800 --> 00:46:03,879
Speaker 2: that the tape runs out, is when the adults really

816
00:46:03,880 --> 00:46:06,239
Speaker 2: started drinking. Because at the end he's like bringing the

817
00:46:06,640 --> 00:46:10,279
Speaker 2: bring in the vat with the flavor ad in it

818
00:46:11,000 --> 00:46:13,120
Speaker 2: so that the adults can start drinking. That's toward the

819
00:46:13,200 --> 00:46:15,839
Speaker 2: end of the tape. But you mentioned somebody standing up.

820
00:46:15,840 --> 00:46:19,719
Speaker 2: A woman named Christy Miller was the sole person who

821
00:46:19,840 --> 00:46:22,200
Speaker 2: challenged Jim Jones directly. She went to the mic and

822
00:46:22,360 --> 00:46:24,759
Speaker 2: was like, yeah, isn't there isn't there any other way,

823
00:46:24,880 --> 00:46:27,200
Speaker 2: like you told us Soviet Union would take us. Is

824
00:46:27,239 --> 00:46:30,480
Speaker 2: it too late for that? You know? As long, I think,

825
00:46:30,480 --> 00:46:33,920
Speaker 2: she said, as long as there's life, there's hope, Like

826
00:46:33,960 --> 00:46:36,640
Speaker 2: we shouldn't do this, and then she also said, I

827
00:46:36,680 --> 00:46:39,120
Speaker 2: think the children would want to live, they should be

828
00:46:39,200 --> 00:46:42,359
Speaker 2: able to live, and she ended up getting shouted down

829
00:46:42,440 --> 00:46:47,040
Speaker 2: by other members, but she tried really hard, and apparently

830
00:46:47,880 --> 00:46:50,120
Speaker 2: she was one of the people who was found at

831
00:46:50,200 --> 00:46:53,680
Speaker 2: Jonestown later on with a puncture mark in her arm,

832
00:46:53,920 --> 00:46:56,720
Speaker 2: and that she was probably killed, that she was murdered.

833
00:46:56,760 --> 00:46:58,600
Speaker 2: She didn't she didn't drink the kool aid or the

834
00:46:58,640 --> 00:47:02,680
Speaker 2: flavor aid herself. She was probably injected with cyanide, and

835
00:47:02,719 --> 00:47:07,480
Speaker 2: that's almost certainly how she died. But she was extremely

836
00:47:07,600 --> 00:47:11,440
Speaker 2: brave for trying to save all those people, and it

837
00:47:11,640 --> 00:47:16,439
Speaker 2: was useless because Jim Jones knew there was no other

838
00:47:16,520 --> 00:47:18,480
Speaker 2: way out for him. He was going to kill himself,

839
00:47:19,200 --> 00:47:21,640
Speaker 2: and that he couldn't very well leave these people alive

840
00:47:21,680 --> 00:47:25,360
Speaker 2: without him. And he specifically says, you're gonna do this,

841
00:47:25,480 --> 00:47:27,480
Speaker 2: you want to do this. There's no life without me,

842
00:47:28,200 --> 00:47:31,680
Speaker 2: and I'm gonna die, so we all need to die together,

843
00:47:32,360 --> 00:47:36,320
Speaker 2: and he's encouraging them outright, encouraging them Chuck. On this tape,

844
00:47:36,320 --> 00:47:39,759
Speaker 2: you can hear him how he gets them to take

845
00:47:39,800 --> 00:47:43,839
Speaker 2: their own lives and kill their own children. It's like

846
00:47:43,960 --> 00:47:47,560
Speaker 2: that's it went from like bleak research to just like,

847
00:47:47,840 --> 00:47:51,200
Speaker 2: I can't believe this actually happened, Like my brain kept

848
00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:53,960
Speaker 2: like repelling from wrapping itself around it.

849
00:47:54,680 --> 00:47:57,399
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was, like I said, I couldn't even listen

850
00:47:57,440 --> 00:47:58,919
Speaker 3: to it all the way through. I had to kind

851
00:47:58,920 --> 00:48:02,600
Speaker 3: of just skip ahead. But you did mention, and this is,

852
00:48:02,680 --> 00:48:04,600
Speaker 3: you know, this is the fact that most people know

853
00:48:04,680 --> 00:48:08,120
Speaker 3: by now, because usually that guy at every party likes

854
00:48:08,160 --> 00:48:11,680
Speaker 3: to point out that it was not actually kool aid drink.

855
00:48:11,719 --> 00:48:13,600
Speaker 3: The kool aid has become a euphemism. But it was

856
00:48:13,719 --> 00:48:17,280
Speaker 3: great flavor aid in fact, and it had a bunch

857
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,640
Speaker 3: of stuff in it. It had one, two, three, four, five, six,

858
00:48:20,719 --> 00:48:26,520
Speaker 3: seven different you know, various sedatives and antipsychotics, and there

859
00:48:26,560 --> 00:48:28,920
Speaker 3: was one malaria medication in there for some reason.

860
00:48:28,920 --> 00:48:29,680
Speaker 1: I'm not sure why.

861
00:48:30,560 --> 00:48:35,280
Speaker 3: Valium, but cyanide was ultimately what you know, did everyone

862
00:48:35,320 --> 00:48:39,440
Speaker 3: in And like you said, they killed the children first

863
00:48:39,600 --> 00:48:42,680
Speaker 3: by putting it in a syringe and shooting it in

864
00:48:42,719 --> 00:48:46,319
Speaker 3: their mouth, and then other people took it willingly, and

865
00:48:46,360 --> 00:48:49,920
Speaker 3: then like you said, in the case of Christine Miller,

866
00:48:50,160 --> 00:48:54,840
Speaker 3: that she was injected like other people were, obviously against

867
00:48:54,880 --> 00:48:57,719
Speaker 3: her will. And a lot of people thought it was

868
00:48:57,719 --> 00:48:59,920
Speaker 3: another White Night rehearsal, so they went along with it,

869
00:49:00,080 --> 00:49:03,160
Speaker 3: maybe not knowing that they were really gonna die. And

870
00:49:03,400 --> 00:49:07,440
Speaker 3: in the end, nine hundred and eighteen people died in Guyana,

871
00:49:08,680 --> 00:49:12,120
Speaker 3: nine hundred and seven from the poisoning. Then Annie Moore

872
00:49:12,239 --> 00:49:16,960
Speaker 3: and Jim Jones either killed themselves with their own gun

873
00:49:17,040 --> 00:49:21,919
Speaker 3: or had one of the Red Brigade do it. Three

874
00:49:22,040 --> 00:49:25,280
Speaker 3: I'm sorry. Two hundred and seventy six of these victims

875
00:49:25,280 --> 00:49:28,799
Speaker 3: were kids, and then there were people that went out

876
00:49:28,800 --> 00:49:32,560
Speaker 3: into the jungle. Other people died later. There was this

877
00:49:32,719 --> 00:49:36,600
Speaker 3: really sort of sad, bizarre story of this woman named

878
00:49:36,600 --> 00:49:40,520
Speaker 3: Sharon Amos, who was a temple member who was in Georgetown, Guyana,

879
00:49:40,560 --> 00:49:44,040
Speaker 3: who got the message that you need to kill yourself,

880
00:49:44,600 --> 00:49:48,040
Speaker 3: and so she killed her two young kids and then

881
00:49:48,080 --> 00:49:51,600
Speaker 3: her third, her twenty one year old daughter, Leanne Harris.

882
00:49:51,640 --> 00:49:55,399
Speaker 3: Apparently they looked at each other and either slit each

883
00:49:55,440 --> 00:49:58,879
Speaker 3: other's throats or their own throats. There were two other

884
00:49:58,880 --> 00:50:01,400
Speaker 3: people in the bathroom, ten year old named Stephanie Brown

885
00:50:01,840 --> 00:50:04,400
Speaker 3: and a forty three year old man named Charles Beekman.

886
00:50:05,640 --> 00:50:09,520
Speaker 3: He was charged with her attempted murder because he cut her,

887
00:50:09,719 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 3: but he told her, hey, I have to Apparently he

888
00:50:12,719 --> 00:50:14,360
Speaker 3: was trying to help her live, and he said, I

889
00:50:14,440 --> 00:50:18,279
Speaker 3: have to cut you to make it look real. And

890
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:21,480
Speaker 3: he got off on five years because she corroborated that

891
00:50:21,600 --> 00:50:24,920
Speaker 3: story in court, so he didn't, you know, get a

892
00:50:24,920 --> 00:50:25,600
Speaker 3: full conviction.

893
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:29,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot of really weird, bizarre stories about

894
00:50:30,000 --> 00:50:32,480
Speaker 2: you know, what people did when faced with this, you know.

895
00:50:33,360 --> 00:50:34,240
Speaker 1: Yeah.

896
00:50:34,320 --> 00:50:36,719
Speaker 2: One of the things from that tape. One more thing

897
00:50:36,719 --> 00:50:40,120
Speaker 2: about the tape that really got me was there somebody

898
00:50:40,440 --> 00:50:43,560
Speaker 2: like people were testifying. People were coming up and getting

899
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:46,960
Speaker 2: the mic and thanking Dad, thanking Jim Jones. For one

900
00:50:46,960 --> 00:50:49,640
Speaker 2: guy goes, thank you, you know, Dad for giving me life,

901
00:50:50,040 --> 00:50:52,800
Speaker 2: and then you know, as an afterthought, he's like and death.

902
00:50:53,480 --> 00:50:56,799
Speaker 2: Like they were thanking him for this. Right. So one

903
00:50:56,840 --> 00:50:58,600
Speaker 2: person came up to the mic and said, all you

904
00:50:58,680 --> 00:51:01,880
Speaker 2: people along the way wall crying over there, this is

905
00:51:01,960 --> 00:51:03,600
Speaker 2: not a time to be sad. This is this is

906
00:51:03,600 --> 00:51:06,319
Speaker 2: something to be happy for. And the fact that there

907
00:51:06,320 --> 00:51:12,160
Speaker 2: were people crying along the wall, to me, those were

908
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:15,120
Speaker 2: the people who who knew they didn't have any way out,

909
00:51:15,680 --> 00:51:18,239
Speaker 2: not because you know, the US military was coming to

910
00:51:18,320 --> 00:51:21,560
Speaker 2: kill everyone and torture the children, but because they the

911
00:51:21,760 --> 00:51:24,279
Speaker 2: Jim Jones's people were not going to let them leave.

912
00:51:24,680 --> 00:51:27,480
Speaker 2: It was either try to get away and be killed shot,

913
00:51:27,880 --> 00:51:30,000
Speaker 2: or drink the kool aid yourself and be part of

914
00:51:30,000 --> 00:51:32,759
Speaker 2: the revolutionary suicide. And they were scared to death. They

915
00:51:32,760 --> 00:51:36,000
Speaker 2: didn't want to die. They were literally grieving their own

916
00:51:36,120 --> 00:51:40,640
Speaker 2: death right before they died. And that was the choice,

917
00:51:40,680 --> 00:51:43,359
Speaker 2: like you couldn't you weren't allowed to leave, you had

918
00:51:43,400 --> 00:51:47,040
Speaker 2: to drink the flavorrate. But a couple of people did

919
00:51:47,080 --> 00:51:52,160
Speaker 2: get away, these survivors who literally escaped the tent that

920
00:51:52,200 --> 00:51:55,560
Speaker 2: the people were killing themselves in and got away and

921
00:51:55,880 --> 00:51:58,799
Speaker 2: snuck off into the jungle. And those people are like

922
00:51:59,000 --> 00:52:02,719
Speaker 2: really important sources of information for what happened because they

923
00:52:02,719 --> 00:52:05,879
Speaker 2: saw people dying. They didn't leave right before they left,

924
00:52:05,920 --> 00:52:07,799
Speaker 2: like during this whole thing, at the height of it,

925
00:52:08,719 --> 00:52:11,440
Speaker 2: and they came back and they did all sorts of

926
00:52:11,520 --> 00:52:15,920
Speaker 2: terrible things. They had to identify bodies, they had to

927
00:52:16,960 --> 00:52:19,480
Speaker 2: they had to explain what was going on. They one

928
00:52:19,520 --> 00:52:24,440
Speaker 2: guy is named Charles Clayton. He was a really important

929
00:52:24,480 --> 00:52:27,560
Speaker 2: source for a lot of the documentaries. You'll see he

930
00:52:27,600 --> 00:52:33,080
Speaker 2: slipped away and got away unnoticed, and that whole identifying

931
00:52:33,160 --> 00:52:36,040
Speaker 2: the bodies thing. I know, I sound like I'm rambling

932
00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:38,640
Speaker 2: but there's just so much to talk about, but we

933
00:52:38,719 --> 00:52:42,400
Speaker 2: probably should should go to that part about the aftermath,

934
00:52:42,440 --> 00:52:46,120
Speaker 2: because I mentioned that Jackie Spears was alone on the

935
00:52:46,120 --> 00:52:50,160
Speaker 2: airstrip a couple miles away from Jonestown for twenty two hours,

936
00:52:50,800 --> 00:52:55,680
Speaker 2: and the people of Jonestown killed themselves within an hour

937
00:52:55,719 --> 00:53:00,640
Speaker 2: and a half maybe two hours of the fascination of

938
00:53:00,719 --> 00:53:03,960
Speaker 2: Leo Ryan and those people. So that meant that that

939
00:53:04,120 --> 00:53:10,040
Speaker 2: it was just as totally quiet, eerie village of the

940
00:53:10,160 --> 00:53:15,080
Speaker 2: dead for a good twenty hours before any outsiders came

941
00:53:15,120 --> 00:53:16,480
Speaker 2: in and saw what had happened.

942
00:53:18,680 --> 00:53:19,080
Speaker 1: Terrible.

943
00:53:19,360 --> 00:53:21,440
Speaker 2: Can you imagine?

944
00:53:21,760 --> 00:53:22,520
Speaker 1: It was horrifying?

945
00:53:23,000 --> 00:53:29,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, still is so one more kind of like little

946
00:53:29,680 --> 00:53:34,600
Speaker 2: add on. That was the worst civilian casualty of American

947
00:53:34,719 --> 00:53:38,600
Speaker 2: civilians in history, and it's remained that way until nine

948
00:53:38,640 --> 00:53:43,080
Speaker 2: to eleven. But the first responders who came, who had

949
00:53:43,080 --> 00:53:47,200
Speaker 2: who were responsible for getting these Americans their bodies back

950
00:53:47,280 --> 00:53:50,560
Speaker 2: home so that their families could claim them over the

951
00:53:50,600 --> 00:53:53,000
Speaker 2: course of like a terrible week in the heat, in

952
00:53:53,080 --> 00:53:57,400
Speaker 2: the storms and all that they were largely from the

953
00:53:57,440 --> 00:54:00,480
Speaker 2: Air Force, and the Air Force conducted a study on

954
00:54:00,600 --> 00:54:04,040
Speaker 2: how that experience impacted them, and it turned out to

955
00:54:04,080 --> 00:54:07,399
Speaker 2: be the first study of how something like that, how

956
00:54:07,440 --> 00:54:10,040
Speaker 2: first responders are affected by the things they see and

957
00:54:10,120 --> 00:54:13,600
Speaker 2: have to do from you know, mass casualty events in history.

958
00:54:13,840 --> 00:54:17,480
Speaker 2: And it really kind of created that whole field of

959
00:54:17,520 --> 00:54:23,959
Speaker 2: study essentially, Oh wow, yeah, something else, you got anything else?

960
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:27,839
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's one more odd little fact that you dug

961
00:54:27,920 --> 00:54:33,120
Speaker 3: up that is fairly remarkable because the congress person Ryan

962
00:54:33,640 --> 00:54:35,040
Speaker 3: who was sadly killed.

963
00:54:34,760 --> 00:54:39,080
Speaker 1: That day, didn't his daughter end up in a cult.

964
00:54:39,239 --> 00:54:42,080
Speaker 2: Not just a cult, the cult that was featured in

965
00:54:42,160 --> 00:54:45,720
Speaker 2: Wild Wild Country, that Netflix documentary. She was a member

966
00:54:45,760 --> 00:54:49,279
Speaker 2: of that cult and ended up being married by that

967
00:54:49,440 --> 00:54:52,640
Speaker 2: guru in the ranch in Oregon a couple of years

968
00:54:52,640 --> 00:54:55,640
Speaker 2: after her father died. And they actually had a bottle

969
00:54:55,640 --> 00:54:58,120
Speaker 2: of champagne that said the guru, I can't remember the

970
00:54:58,120 --> 00:55:02,760
Speaker 2: guru's name, can turn even grape kool aid into wine.

971
00:55:03,320 --> 00:55:03,720
Speaker 1: Wow.

972
00:55:03,920 --> 00:55:08,040
Speaker 2: So they even made a joke about it at the wedding. Yeah,

973
00:55:08,080 --> 00:55:10,920
Speaker 2: it's nuts, man, I just thought that I couldn't believe it.

974
00:55:11,360 --> 00:55:14,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a fantastic nugget to end on.

975
00:55:14,280 --> 00:55:16,920
Speaker 2: Thanks a lot, Well, sin Chuck said that was a

976
00:55:16,920 --> 00:55:20,040
Speaker 2: fantastic nugget. Of course, everybody. That means it's time for

977
00:55:20,160 --> 00:55:21,040
Speaker 2: listener mail.

978
00:55:22,600 --> 00:55:25,800
Speaker 3: All right, this is about the Christian heavy metal band Striper.

979
00:55:25,920 --> 00:55:28,800
Speaker 3: Of course, what a better way to finish out this episode.

980
00:55:29,600 --> 00:55:31,719
Speaker 3: Hey guys, grew up in the middle of the Canadian

981
00:55:31,719 --> 00:55:34,719
Speaker 3: Prairies in the seventies and eighties and was fourteen when

982
00:55:34,760 --> 00:55:38,680
Speaker 3: Striper's Soldiers under Command came out and fifteen when to

983
00:55:38,800 --> 00:55:41,200
Speaker 3: Hell with the Devil hit me like a ton of

984
00:55:41,200 --> 00:55:44,880
Speaker 3: bricks on this rock was built much of who I

985
00:55:44,920 --> 00:55:47,360
Speaker 3: still am. I learned how to play drums along with

986
00:55:47,480 --> 00:55:50,560
Speaker 3: Robert Sweet, but unlike Chuck, never had the opportunity to

987
00:55:50,560 --> 00:55:54,160
Speaker 3: see them live, as they rarely played Canada. They broke

988
00:55:54,239 --> 00:55:56,920
Speaker 3: up in the early nineties, and that I thought was that,

989
00:55:57,360 --> 00:55:59,560
Speaker 3: even though they got back together in two thousand and five,

990
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:02,719
Speaker 3: I never managed to catch them live the few times

991
00:56:02,719 --> 00:56:06,280
Speaker 3: they snuck across the border until that is this summer

992
00:56:06,760 --> 00:56:09,120
Speaker 3: when I was down in Vancouver visiting the in laws

993
00:56:09,120 --> 00:56:11,719
Speaker 3: and they were playing Seattle, and I drove the three

994
00:56:11,800 --> 00:56:14,959
Speaker 3: hours to see them. It was an amazing show. They're

995
00:56:14,960 --> 00:56:17,160
Speaker 3: no longer playing the giant stadiums, of course, but.

996
00:56:17,760 --> 00:56:19,440
Speaker 1: I don't know if they ever played giant stadiums.

997
00:56:20,280 --> 00:56:23,880
Speaker 3: But being able to stand ten feet from guitarist Oz Fox,

998
00:56:24,160 --> 00:56:26,319
Speaker 3: who can still shred after all these years, was an

999
00:56:26,360 --> 00:56:29,880
Speaker 3: amazing experience. They still got all the hair and vocalist

1000
00:56:29,920 --> 00:56:33,000
Speaker 3: Michael Sweet can still hit those high notes, though not

1001
00:56:33,040 --> 00:56:35,279
Speaker 3: as many as he used to. But after forty years,

1002
00:56:35,280 --> 00:56:38,440
Speaker 3: they are very very good at making music. They're doing

1003
00:56:38,520 --> 00:56:43,080
Speaker 3: an acoustic tour this year twenty twenty four, called to

1004
00:56:43,120 --> 00:56:47,640
Speaker 3: Hell with the Amps and they're kicking off, kicking it

1005
00:56:47,719 --> 00:56:51,239
Speaker 3: off down in Georgia playing Mad Life in Woodstock. I

1006
00:56:51,239 --> 00:56:54,360
Speaker 3: haven't heard of that venue, and this is a May thirtieth,

1007
00:56:54,360 --> 00:56:56,160
Speaker 3: and I bet Chuck would have a hell.

1008
00:56:55,960 --> 00:56:56,480
Speaker 1: Of a time.

1009
00:56:56,920 --> 00:56:59,120
Speaker 3: Who knows, they might even play a couple of songs

1010
00:56:59,160 --> 00:56:59,880
Speaker 3: he recognizes.

1011
00:57:00,520 --> 00:57:03,680
Speaker 1: That is from Trent. You gonna go and I don't know,

1012
00:57:03,880 --> 00:57:04,840
Speaker 1: only if you go with me?

1013
00:57:05,040 --> 00:57:08,719
Speaker 2: Oh boy, I wasn't expecting that. We'll see. We'll talk

1014
00:57:08,719 --> 00:57:12,520
Speaker 2: about it offline. That was Trent.

1015
00:57:12,600 --> 00:57:14,080
Speaker 1: Huh, that's Trent.

1016
00:57:14,120 --> 00:57:16,640
Speaker 2: Thanks a lot, Trent. That was a great email. Appreciate

1017
00:57:16,680 --> 00:57:20,520
Speaker 2: the update on Striper And if you have one on

1018
00:57:20,640 --> 00:57:24,160
Speaker 2: the guy who did Life as a Highway, it turns

1019
00:57:24,200 --> 00:57:27,000
Speaker 2: out to be Tom Cochrane. I don't remember if you

1020
00:57:27,040 --> 00:57:29,400
Speaker 2: said that in the episode or not. We would see

1021
00:57:29,440 --> 00:57:33,560
Speaker 2: the right I would If you want to be like Trent,

1022
00:57:33,640 --> 00:57:36,280
Speaker 2: you can get in touch with us at stuff podcast

1023
00:57:36,480 --> 00:57:39,880
Speaker 2: at iHeartRadio dot com.

1024
00:57:41,760 --> 00:57:44,640
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For

1025
00:57:44,760 --> 00:57:48,920
Speaker 1: more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

1026
00:57:49,040 --> 00:57:50,880
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.