The Jonestown Report, November 1999, Volume 1
Alternative Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple
http://jonestown.sdsu.edu

12 November 1999

1. African American Voices on Jonestown
2. Introducing the jonestown report
3. Transcripts of Peoples Temple audiotapes available
4. FCC audiotapes released under FOIA to be made public on website
5. Freedom of Information updates
6. Jonestown on the Web
7. Book notes
8. Speakers bureau
9. Naming the Jonestown dead

 

1. African American Voices on Jonestown
   Several African Americans have expressed a desire and availability to talk to the public about their experiences in Peoples Temple from the Black perspective. Their willingness to speak presents a unique opportunity to hear voices which have generally been excluded from the dialogue about Peoples Temple and Jonestown. Please consider the following two individuals when looking for articulate analyses of Peoples Temple.
   
   Yulanda Williams lived in Jonestown for three months in 1977, before leaving Peoples Temple. Her father was a minister and she herself held offices within the church. She can be reached at yopopo@mindspring.com. Ms. Williams has spoken at conferences on fraud, high tech crimes, and cults
   
   Lezle Fortier escaped from Jonestown with nine others on the morning of 18 November 1978. She grew up in Peoples Temple from the age of 12 on, and so has a special perspective on life in the organization. She can be contacted at TCLESCAT@aol.com and would like to talk about her experiences as a member of an inter-racial family in Jonestown.
   
   
2. Introducing the jonestown report
   The jonestown report is an on-line and print resource summarizing research and news about studies on Peoples Temple and Jonestown, as well as the events of 18 November 1978. This is the first of what we anticipate will be a yearly report
   
   Given the fact that a number of persons knowledgeable about Peoples Temple have died in the past two decades, coupled with the loss of documents over the years, it seems imperative for researchers to make every effort to retrieve as many documents and conduct as many interviews as possible, before this information is irretrievably lost
   
   The jonestown report makes available what researchers have found and what they are doing, and points to the need to recover as much as possible through Freedom of Information Act requests, personal interviews with persons connected with Peoples Temple, research at the California Historical Society, and other sources of information.
   
   If you would like to contribute information about what you have located or want to share findings, please contact the editors. We also welcome feedback, comments, suggestions, and criticism.
   
   To contact us, call or write: Rebecca Moore, Dept. of Religious Studies, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego CA 92182, 619/594-6252, or e-mail remoore@mail.sdsu.edu; or write to Fielding M. McGehee III, 3553 Eugene Place, San Diego, CA 92116, 619/584-1841.
   
   
3. Transcripts of Peoples Temple audiotapes available
   The editors of the jonestown report are in the process of uploading a number of transcripts and summaries of the hundreds of audiotapes which the FBI recovered from Jonestown following the deaths in 1978. Twenty of them will be available by the end of November on the "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple" website, which may be found at its new address: http://jonestown.sdsu.edu. Other transcripts will be added in coming months
   
   The tapes transcribed so far consist principally of meetings of the Jonestown community — mostly chaired by Jim Jones, but including the voices of other Jonestown residents — during 1978. Several of the tapes were recorded during one White Night in April 1978. There are also transcripts of sermons and other recordings of Jones from San Francisco and Los Angeles soon to be available on the website
   
   Summaries of the tapes — also new to the website — will offer capsules of the conversations, lists of people either who are mentioned by name and/or who speak on the tape, and documentation (as far as it can be determined) of the date of the tape.
   
   Many tapes remain
   The FBI catalogued several hundred of the Jonestown tapes within a year of recovering them as it developed evidence to prosecute Larry Layton on charges of assassinating a Congressman. Many of the tapes were blank or contained nothing but music. For the remaining tapes — about 400 of them — the FBI divided them into categories such as "Jones Speaking," "Radio Transmissions," and "Unidentified Persons Speaking." It then prepared short summaries for each of these tapes. However, since the summaries had a limited purpose and the agents who reviewed them had limited knowledge of the people whose voices they were hearing, the summaries are sketchy at best.
   
   After reviewing the summaries which the FBI prepared, the editors of the jonestown report requested about 200 of the tapes. These tapes promise to reveal the daily workings of the Jonestown community, the early sermons of Jim Jones, and the voices of the members of Peoples Temple.
   
   While we have not transcribed even a substantial portion of the tapes, we are willing to share what we have received. For a copy of our compilation of FBI summaries, or for copies of the tapes themselves, write to us through our e-mail address remoore@mail.sdsu.edu or our street address (Fielding M. McGehee III, 3553 Eugene Place, San Diego, CA 92116). We can offer the summaries at no charge, but will request the cost of tapes and postage for any requests for duplication.
   
   We can also provide you with a list of tapes we have not requested, in case you have additional interests.
   
   If you prefer to contact the FBI directly, the tapes are also available under the Freedom of Information Act for the cost of duplication, which is about $1.50 per tape. The address is:
   
   Freedom of Information/Privacy Acts Section
   Office of Public and Congressional Affairs
   Federal Bureau of Investigation
   935 Pennsylvania Ave., NW
   Washington, DC 20535
   
   
4. FCC audiotapes released under FOIA to be made public on website
   by Brian Csuk
   Manager of http://www.icehouse.net/zodiac/index.html [This website has not been operational since April 2000 – ed., 13 August 2001]
   
   In August 1998 I asked for copies of the 25 audio cassettes and 4 reel-to-reel tapes, and/or transcripts of tapes FCC engineers had made of Peoples Temple radio traffic. Last November I got a call from Larry Clance at the FCC letting me know that they couldn’t find the tapes in their archives. It turns out the tapes weren’t even in the same building as the FCC archives. They turned up in a cardboard box at the FCC’s Columbia, Maryland monitoring station. The only other things in the box were an 80-100 page log of the transmissions, which was unreadable from being photocopied numerous times. Also included was a copy of the court subpoena ordering the FCC to turn over the original tapes for use at the grand jury that was considering indictments in the case against Larry Layton. The FCC never got the originals back, but did make copies before they turned the tapes over.
   
   Since the tapes had never been released before, the FCC had to go through the material to see if there was anything that needed to be redacted, a process that took three and a half months. I eventually got copies of everything but the reel-to-reel tapes: the FCC wanted to charge me $175 to make a dub and refused to grant a fee waiver.
   
   The quality of the recordings varies from excellent to almost unintelligible. The topics covered range from a short discussion of the TV sitcom "Fernwood Tonight" with Martin Mull, to Jones talking about pulling the settlement out of Guyana and going to Europe. Also included are conversations with Jones, Tim Stoen, John Stoen, Deborah Layton, Maria Katsaris, Sharon Amos, and Paula Adams, among others.
   
   I was not the first person to ask for these tapes. In 1979, James Reston, Jr. (author of Our Father Who Art in Hell and the NPR documentary Father Cares: The Last of Jonestown) filed an FOIA request with the FCC for the tapes. The FCC denied the request, citing article 605 of the Communications Act of 1934 which specifically deemed commercial shortwave radio transmissions as confidential. Reston appealed the denial but was turned down. That was the end of it until 1980, when the Communications Act was amended making article 605 no longer confidential. The tapes sat there for eighteen years and no one asked for a copy until I did in 1998.
   
   I am in the process of uploading the audio so that they can be heard as audio files on the Internet. Stayed tuned!
   
   
5. Freedom of Information updates
   Although the process of obtaining documents under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) can be time-consuming, frustrating and fraught with delays, the agencies of the federal government which are subject to the law nevertheless house thousands of official documents related to Peoples Temple. The records include those generated by the group itself; others show the extent of government interest in and surveillance of the Temple. Among the agencies contacted in recent months:
   
   Federal Communications Commission (FCC): Twenty-five audiotapes of Peoples Temple shortwave radio traffic recorded by the FCC have been released to independent researcher Brian Csuk (see article above).
   
   Social Security Administration (SSA): According to Darrell Blevins, the Freedom of Information Officer at SSA, the agency destroyed its list of beneficiaries who died in Jonestown "years ago." In a letter of 11 June 1999 to Fielding McGehee, who had requested SSA records on beneficiaries in Jonestown, Blevins wrote that the agency would have records by SSA number, and possibly by name. But the list it created of those who died is long since gone.
   
   Department of State: This agency has yet to respond substantially to an October 1998 request by McGehee, who asked for the preliminary lists which the agency developed in the course of compiling the official list of Jonestown dead, which was released on 17 December 1978.
   
   Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI): According to Linda Kloss in the FBI’s Freedom of Information office, the agency is considering putting all of its Jonestown documents — all 48,000 pages of releasable material — on CD-rom so that the public can have complete access. This would relieve the burden on the FBI of individually processing the FOIA requests filed. It would represent one of the FBI’s first uses of a CD-rom as a means of compliance with the FOIA.
   
   In the meantime, the FBI is processing several other requests for documents which Rebecca Moore made under FOIA. The requests, filed in July 1999, ask for:
   • The Guyana Evidence Index, which was created by the FBI in 1979 to categorize and organize materials collected in Jonestown, Guyana;
   • Records related to the seven autopsies performed on people who died in Jonestown;
   • Documents which might be identified as "Dear Dad" letters or "Dear Jim [Jones]" letters;
   • Documents used by the FBI in the government’s criminal trials of Larry Layton; and
   • Records on seven people within the Temple leadership, including Richard Tropp, Harriet Tropp, Gene Chaikin, Jann Gurvich, Maria Katsaris, Jim McElvane and Mike Prokes. All except Prokes died in Jonestown; Prokes committed suicide at a press conference in March 1979.
   
   The Church of Scientology received 39,000 documents from the FBI in March 1997, after making an initial request in 1993. According to Scientology the documents include 8,603 from the FBI’s investigative files and an additional 30,229 pages. It is not clear whether the FBI’s figure of 48,000 includes these items or not.
   
   
6. Jonestown on the Web
   The following are websites which have news, information and government documents about Peoples Temple and Jonestown.
   Primary source documents from the U.S. State Department [were] available through "The Jonestown, Guyana Tragedy" at http://www.icehouse.net/zodiac/index.html [ed. note 6 Sept 2001: this site is no longer operational]. The site is managed by Brian Csuk (see article "FCC audiotapes released under FOIA soon to be made public on website" above).
   
   Jonestown.com "serves the dual purpose of education and exposé of one of the most covered-up and lied about events in modern history." It is managed by Laurie Efrein Kahalas, a former member of Peoples Temple, whose book, Snake Dance: Unraveling the Mysteries of Jonestown, is described in the Book notes section of this report. See http://www.jonestown.com.
   
   A historical re-enactment of the last hours of Peoples Temple, along with "living history displays" depicting daily life in Jonestown is described at http://www.jonestownreenactment.org.
   
   The FBI has over 360 pages of internal investigative reports on line at http://foia.fbi.gov/jonestown.htm. The material released thus far comprises interviews with survivors of the attack at the Port Kaituma Airstrip on 18 November 1978. An immediate problem is apparent: direct access to the files is great, but who’s going to file appeals on the exemptions to redacted materials? Further, who will have standing to challenge these exemptions in court? (Note: the files are in PDF format and require Acrobat Reader to access.)
   
   The Guyana Tribute Foundation sponsors the Jonestown Memorial Project and the yearly memorial service: http://www.jones-town.org. It is managed by Jynona Norwood.
   
   "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple" has moved from the University of North Dakota to a new URL. Appearing on the site are completely revised lists of those who died and those who survived Jonestown. The newest additions to the site, which may be downloaded for use by scholars and students, will be transcripts and summaries of audiotapes which the FBI recovered from Jonestown (see separate story). The new website address is http://jonestown.sdsu.edu. It is managed by Rebecca Moore and Fielding M. McGehee III, the editors of this report.
   
   
7. Book notes
   The following are books and articles about Jonestown which have been published within the last few years or will be published soon.
   
   A book which includes a chapter on Jonestown and a comparative look at Peoples Temple in the context of other apocalyptic religious conflict comes from John R. Hall with Philip D. Schuyler and Sylvaine Trinh, Apocalypse Observed: Religious Movements and Violence in North America, Europe, and Japan (London: Routledge, 2000).
   
   Another comparative study comes from Catherine Wessinger, titled How the Millennium Comes Violently: From Jonestown to Heaven’s Gate (New York: Seven Bridges Press, 1999).
   
   Mary Maaga's Hearing the Voices of Jonestown (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1998) looks at the role of women in Peoples Temple.
   
   From Italy see, Enrico Pozzi, Il carisma malato. Il People’s Temple e il suicidio collettivo di Jonestown (Naples: Liguori, 1992), and Massimo Introvigne, Idee che uccidono. Jonestown, Waco, il Tempio Solare (Milan: Pessano MIMEP-Docete, 1995).
   
   Laurie Efrein Kahalas, a former member of Peoples Temple, published Snake Dance: Unraveling the Mysteries of Jonestown in 1998 (available through amazon.com). The book provides an insider’s autobiographical view and makes the case for a "far right wing conspiracy" against Peoples Temple. Kahalas is currently developing On the Record: The Book of Documents, which provides several hundred quotations from an array of internal documents, including public records and news reports as well as information from Peoples Temple files. She is also writing a spiritual diary of the events at Jonestown titled And the Angels Wept. Kahalas manages the website http://www.jonestown.com (noted under Internet sites).
   
   An interesting article appears in Lobster 37 by Jim Hougan, Jonestown: The Secret Life of Jim Jones. A Parapolitical Fugue (Summer 1999). Lobster is a progressive British publication focusing on right-wing terrorism and spying; edited and published by Robin Ramsay at 214 Westbourne Avenue, Hull, HU5 3JB, UK; e-mail robin@lobster.karoo.co.uk. Hougan’s e-mail address is jimhougan@aol.com.
   
   Two letters written by Annie Moore, who died in Jonestown, appear in Letters of the Century: America 1900-1999, edited by Lisa Brunwald and Stephen J. Adler (Dial Press, 1999). One of the letters was written either during or after the deaths in Jonestown.
   
   For an apostate view, see Deborah Layton’s Seductive Poison: A Jonestown Survivor’s Story of Life and Death in the Peoples Temple (New York: Doubleday, 1998). Book promotion appears on her website http://www.deborahlayton.com.
   
   
8. Speakers bureau
   A number of speakers are available and willing to talk about Peoples Temple and Jonestown to various groups. A brief list follows.
   
   Please note: some of these email addresses may no longer be operational.
   
   John R. Hall, Department of Sociology, University of California - Davis, Davis, CA 95616; telephone 530/752-7035; e-mail jrhall@ucdavis.edu
   
   Jim Hougan, 4209 Taylors Creek Road, Apton, VA 22920; e-mail jimhougan@aol.com
   
   Massimo Introvigne, CESNUR - Center for Studies on New Religions, Via Juvarra 20, Torino, Italy 10122; telephone 39-011-541905; e-mail cesnur@tin.it
   
   Laurie Efrein Kahalas, P.O. Box 1801, Murray Hill Station, New York NY 10156; telephone 212/889-6432; e-mail dkahalas@earthlink.net.
   
   Rebecca Moore, Department of Religious Studies, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, CA 92182-8143; telephone 619/594-6252; e-mail remoore@mail.sdsu.edu.
   
   Catherine Wessinger, Department of Religious Studies, Loyola University, 6363 St. Charles Avenue, New Orleans LA 70118; telephone 504/865-3182; e-mail wessing@loyno.edu.
   
   
9. Naming the Jonestown dead
   More than twenty years after their deaths in Jonestown, many of the people have finally been named.
   
   A list of the Jonestown dead compiled in the last year includes 870 people, including approximately 220 people who were not on any previous lists. The list, assembled from Guyanese immigration forms and Peoples Temple documents, as well as U.S. government documents, appears at http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/AboutJonestown/WhoDied/whodied_list.php.
   
   The official list of Jonestown dead, compiled by the U.S. State Department and released in December 1978, had approximately 650 names. The House Foreign Affairs Committee issued a supplemental list five months later in its report on the assassination of Congressman Leo Ryan, but there were few additional names on it. The gap of 250 between the named people and the number of bodies removed from Jonestown emerged due to the limited, official sources which government agencies used to develop the list. Relying solely on State Department passport records and Social Security beneficiary information, the agencies ignored another resource: Peoples Temple records which were scattered across Jonestown following the deaths in November 1978.
   
   An analysis of those records, which were released to the editors of this report under the Freedom of Information Act, indicates that Peoples Temple conducted two censuses during the summer of 1978. One lists Jonestown residents by name; a second lists them by the cabins and cottages in which they lived. A majority of names listed on Temple records — but not included on the official death list — were those of children.
   
   We recognize that the list is still incomplete — there are approximately 45 names still missing, and some of those on the list may be in error — and we appreciate any assistance in correcting the omissions, mistakes and inaccuracies which we have made.