Q266 Summary

Summary prepared by Fielding M. McGehee III. If you use this material, please credit The Jonestown Institute. Thank you.

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FBI Catalogue           Jones Speaking

FBI preliminary tape identification note: Labeled in part “9/27/78 News”

Date cues on tape:     News items consistent with label on tape box

People named:

Bible verses cited:      None

Summary:

(Note: This tape was transcribed by Vicki Perry. The editors gratefully acknowledge her invaluable assistance.)

Jim Jones reads the news for September 27, 1978. As with many newscasts, Jones seems to rely upon Soviet or Eastern bloc news sources. The items themselves focus on more international news than most Americans are used to, especially in their coverage of Cuba, Africa and Eastern bloc countries. In addition, the news includes several attacks on Chinese policies, revealing the then-ongoing struggle between the USSR and its Asian neighbor.

The editorial comment that laces through the news – when not that of Jones – criticizes American economic and geopolitical interests. Jones does add his own comments, though, putting stories in the context of object lessons for the people of Jonestown.

There is only one subject not related to the news which Jones raises, and he does so at the beginning of the tape: A storage tent in Jonestown has collapsed and exposed its contents to the elements. Items have been “wasted,” he says, including equipment that people in Jonestown specifically requested and which cost a great deal of money to bring there.

Among the news items which Jones reports on are:

Much of the editorialization is identifiable as being from Jones himself, especially that which seems to be spontaneous and more heartfelt. As he concludes the item on the redevelopment of the Fillmore, which had been the home of the San Francisco Temple, he adds, “Little by little, the Fillmore is being edged out for black people.” When he reports on the police endorsement of erstwhile Temple supporter Gov. Brown, Jones comments, “That’s the end of Brown, in my mind. That is the end, when we can see that kind of shit come from Brown.”

Others are familiar enough to the people of Jonestown. He describes the neutron bomb as a weapon “the Air Force USA jokingly called their nigger bomb,” but he does so twice in this tape, and he has characterized it dozens of times with almost the exact same words elsewhere. Similarly, his invocations of the inevitability of nuclear war – while inspired by news items about China or Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s national security advisor – have not changed in 20 years.

But there are specific messages in the news for the people of Jonestown, and these come from Jones rather than the stories themselves. The high unemployment rate in the Western Addition section of San Francisco leads him to wonder aloud, “That make you want to go back to San Francisco?” He also reminds the community that they don’t have earthquakes in Guyana – such as the one which rocked Iran – and no weather like hurricanes, typhoons or cyclones. Guyana, he says in summary, is “one of the few places in the world that have absolutely no natural disasters.”

Another message with which the residents of Jonestown are well-acquainted – in large part because Jones has many opportunities to deliver it – is his call for people to hang their heads in shame at what their tax dollars do. Rhodesian war planes being used against liberation fighters? They were supplied by the U.S., that means American tax dollars at work. The survival of apartheid? It comes from being propped up by the U.S. government. Somalian plans to invade Ethiopia, a country with a black socialist government? “More of our tax dollars to make our stomach turn and cause guilt if you have any conscience at all.” Napalm bombs which the Moroccan Air Force is dropping on Marxist-nationalist rebels? They are “obtained, of course, you know where, with our tax dollars from the United States and then some of you say you have no guilt.

“I don’t know how,” Jones continues. “Because all of you, if you were a child even and bought a lollipop, you paid taxes on it, [and] it went to help buy these bombs.”

FBI Summary:

Date of transcription: 6/11/79

In connection with the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s investigation into the assassination of U.S. Congressman LEO J. RYAN at Port Kaituma, Guyana, South America, on November 18, 1978, a tape recording was obtained. This tape recording was located in Jonestown, Guyana, South America, and was turned over to U.S. Officials in Guyana and subsequently transported to the United States.

On May 30, 1979, Special Agent (name deleted) reviewed the tape numbered 1B93-12. This tape was found to contain the following:

News reports on current events by Rev. JIM JONES to members of People’s Temple, Jonestown, Guyana.

Differences with FBI Summary:

The summary is accurate and meets the FBI’s purposes.

Tape originally posted March 2010