The Jonestown Report, November 2001, Volume 3
Alternative Considerations of Jonestown & Peoples Temple
http://jonestown.sdsu.edu

1 November 2001

1. Peoples Temple Oral History Project
2. Temple Story To Go On Stage
3. Film To Recall November 1978
4. Peoples Temple And Black Religion In America
5. FBI Sued Over Processing Jonestown Files
6. Transcription Project, Tape Releases Continue
7. Transcripts, Commentary on "Death Tape" on Website
8. Army Cannot Locate Records of Bodylift
9. Dover Air Force Base Finds 34 Pages
10. Jonestown Records Expunged, Lost
11. FOI Updates: 2000-2001
12. Five Major Collections Of FOIA Documents Available
13. Resources At The California Historical Society
14. Report From The California Historical Society
15. Purple Haze: A Video Documentary
16. Obituary
17. Speakers
18. Resources
19. Website Update
20. SDSU Offers Support To Peoples Temple and Jonestown Research
    
    
1. Peoples Temple Oral History Project In an effort to capture as many of the voices and perspectives on Peoples Temple and Jonestown that still exist, the Religious Studies Department and Love Library Special Collections at San Diego State University have inaugurated the Peoples Temple Oral History Project.
   
   With the help of former Temple members, ex-members and apostates, relatives of the Jonestown dead, and others, the project has identified more than 200 people who carry a piece of the Temple's story. With skilled interviewers and knowledgeable sources, project organizers plan to travel throughout California, the Pacific Northwest and across the country to record these voices. Eventually, what will emerge will be a deeper, fuller, more complex history that will challenge all preconceived and previous descriptions of the Peoples Temple movement and the Jonestown community.
   
   Professional archivists and historians will assist the project in preserving the tapes and transcripts in permanent housing in the Special Collections Department of the Love Library at SDSU. Special Collections will supervise storage, access and release of the items. Depending upon participant consent, transcriptions of the tapes will appear on the websites for the Special Collections at SDSU Library, as well as the Department of Religious Studies.
   
   Organizers also anticipate inclusion of the tapes in a book produced by the Department of Religious Studies, use of tape excerpts along with pictures in displays commemorating the Jonestown dead, and archiving them as a permanent resource for future historians and students of the Jonestown tragedy.
   
   We invite those who can refer us to a former member of Peoples Temple, a relative of any of the Jonestown dead, or anyone who has a piece of the Temple story to contact us either through e-mail (remoore@mail.sdsu.edu), regular mail (Rebecca Moore, Department of Religious Studies, SDSU, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, CA 92182-8143), or by phone (619-594-6252).
   
   
2. Temple Story To Go On Stage, by David Dower The Z Space Studio, a San Francisco-based theater center, has commissioned playwright Leigh Fondakowski to develop a theatrical representation of Jonestown. Fondakowski, the head writer for Tectonic Theater's productions of The Laramie Project and Gross Indecencies, will lead a team of writer/actors through a process of research and interviews to bring the story of Peoples Temple to the stage.
   
   Fondakowski and Tectonic have pioneered a process of creating theater from historical materials and from interviews. The Laramie Project and Gross Indecencies both enjoyed critical and popular success around the country, and The Laramie Project has been filmed by HBO. For that production, Fondakowski led a team of writer/actors through a series of interviews with the people of Laramie, Wyoming, as the community struggled to come to grips with the fatal beating of Matthew Shepard, a gay youth murdered by two young Laramie men. The material was eventually edited into the powerful evening of theater, with the play's text drawn verbatim from the interviews. For Gross Indecencies, the Tectonic team created a riveting play from the transcripts of Oscar Wilde's trials, once again using the verbatim texts as the dialogue for the work.
   
   The Peoples Temple project will combine both historical texts and contemporary interviews.
   
   The Z Space Studio is one of the country's leading theater development centers, and the project will be created at the studio's San Francisco facilities. The company of writer/actors will be largely Bay Area professionals working alongside Fondakowski during the research, interviewing, editing, and script development as well as heading the eventual cast for the work. The goal of the process will be to complete the play for a November 2003 opening in conjunction with the 25th anniversary of the deaths in Jonestown, Guyana. People interested in knowing more about this project can e-mail the Z's at www.zspace.org.
   (David Dower is Artistic Director of the Z Space.)
   
3. Film To Recall November 1978, by Paul VanDeCarr
   Paul VanDeCarr, an independent producer, is developing a documentary film on November of 1978 in San Francisco. The film will focus on events related to the Jonestown tragedy on November 18 and the murders of Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk on November 27.
   
   The film is currently in pre-production; that is, research is being conducted, a production team is being assembled, and program supports are being put in place. Starting in the new year, Paul will be conducting interviews with participants and observers of Jonestown and Peoples Temple from a variety of perspectives. Some interviews will be conducted as background, and some will be on-camera interviews which may eventually be used in the final cut of the film. While anyone will be considered for interviews, Paul is particularly interested in finding African American members of the Temple and/or their relatives.
   
   The film does not seek to sensationalize events in any way, but rather will humanize members of the Temple, and document its role in San Francisco life.
   
   Paul is also interested in speaking with other people working on media projects concerning Jonestown and Peoples Temple, such as radio, film, drama, photography and other projects.
   
   Prospective interviewees or other media project producers may contact him by writing to paulvdc@hotmail.com, or Paul VanDeCarr, 87 Dolores St., #505 San Francisco, CA 94103. Please include a brief description of your knowledge or involvement with Jonestown or Peoples Temple, as well as contact information.
   
   
4. Peoples Temple and Black Religion in America
   Three religious studies scholars are editing a volume of essays which examine the roles that African Americans played in the Peoples Temple family, the political and social activism of California in the 1970s, and the Jonestown community. Currently titled Peoples Temple and Black Religion in America, the book brings together a number of different voices on this much-neglected topic, including historical, sociological, theological, and personal analyses.
   The editors plan to include two essays written in 1980 by major African American scholars: C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya's important work "Daddy Jones and Father Divine: The Cult as Political Religion;" and Archie Smith, Jr.'s "An Interpretation of the Peoples Temple and Jonestown: Implications for the Black Church."
   The book will also feature the results of current academic research into the impact of Peoples Temple in San Francisco's Western Addition, the demographics of the Temple membership and of the Jonestown community, and Jim Jones' sermons and his appropriation of Black religious rhetorical styles.
   The editors are Dr. Anthony Pinn, author of Varieties of African American Religious Experience; Dr. Mary Sawyer, author of Black Ecumenism: Implementing the Demands of Justice; and Dr. Rebecca Moore, author and editor of five books on Peoples Temple, including A Sympathetic History of Jonestown. They are developing and soliciting additional essays for the work. Publication date has been tentatively set for the fall of 2003, the 25th anniversary of the deaths in Jonestown.
   
   
5. FBI Sued Over Processing Jonestown Files The editors of the jonestown report have sued the FBI over its handling of several requests made under the Freedom of Information Act for materials related to Peoples Temple. The suit resulted from the agency's inability or unwillingness to review its Jonestown documents and to determine if the exemptions to disclosure claimed in the early 1990s are still valid. Fielding McGehee and Rebecca Moore made numerous FOIA requests to the FBI in 1998 and 1999, seeking information on such disparate subjects as various deceased members of Peoples Temple, the so-called "Dear Dad" letters written to Jim Jones, and the results of the autopsies conducted in December 1978 on seven of the Jonestown dead. The FBI responded that there were more than 48,000 documents -- i.e., the entire Jonestown file -- related to the initial request. It later incorporated all the requests into one, since the agency's response would have been the same for each. The agency eventually released three CDs containing its entire Jonestown file. However, the CDs had neither an index, nor a guide on how to find individual documents. Moreover, since the documents were scanned onto the CDs through an imaging program instead of a word program, there was no access to people or subjects through word searches. The documents also retained the deletions made when the agency initially catalogued the records about ten years ago. With that in mind, McGehee and Moore challenged the privacy, national security and law enforcement exemptions claimed by the FBI. In a letter asking for review of the blacked-out names, for example, the requesters noted that numerous principals have died in the intervening years, and asserted that those individuals could no longer enjoy the privilege of privacy. Within two months, the agency rejected the appeals and affirmed the claims of exemption. In so doing, the requesters later wrote, the FBI failed to meet its responsibility under the law: either it made a good faith review of the documents, using an index which it denies it has; or, more likely, it decided that the documents are as cumbersome to review as they are to read, and dismissed the appeals without considering their merits. The suit was filed on 30 August 2001. The government has asked for a delay in submitting a reply, citing the events of 11 September. The case is currently pending before U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. (McGehee et al. v. Department of Justice, Civil Action #01-1872).
   
   
6. Transcription project, tape releases continue
   The editors of the jonestown report continue to upload transcripts and summaries from the hundreds of audiotapes which the FBI recovered from Jonestown following the deaths in 1978. More than 60 are currently available on the "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple" website, which may be found at
   http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~remoore/jonestown/tapes/tapes.html. A complete list of the transcribed tapes, catalogued by FBI designations and with short descriptions as to contents, may also be found at http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~remoore/jonestown/tapes/summaries.html. In addition, the only known compilation of the FBI's summaries of all 971 tapes may be found at http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~remoore/jonestown/tapes/fbi.html. The editors of the jonestown report also continue to receive releases of additional tapes every month from the FBI, and have almost 400 on hand. The websites indicates the tapes we have with the pound symbol (#) on the compilation of FBI summaries. We have filed requests for the balance of the collection, except for those which are blank or which contain only music, and will make their availability known as we receive them. For copies of any of the tapes in our possession -- whether or not we have summarized them yet -- you may write to us through our e-mail address (fieldingmcgehee@yahoo.com) or our street address (Fielding M. McGehee III, 3553 Eugene Place, San Diego, CA 92116). The cost for duplication and postage is $2.00 per tape.
   
   
7. Transcription project, tape releases continue
   A number of transcripts of the so-called "death tape" -- the audiotape of the moments leading up to and during the mass deaths in Jonestown -- have been added to the "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown" website. They include complete transcripts by: Mary Maaga, who included the transcript as an appendix to her book, Hearing the Voices of Jonestown;
   The FBI, which transcribed this tape alone of the 971 tapes it recovered from Jonestown; and
   The editors of the jonestown report.
   As with any audiotape -- and especially one with as much background activity as occurs on the death tape -- the transcribers heard different things. Nevertheless, the variations among these three are relatively minor.
   In addition, the website includes partial transcripts of the tape which appeared in Mark Lane's book, The Strongest Poison; as an appendix in Jonathan Z. Smith's book, Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown; and as an appendix in Steve Rose's book, Jesus and Jim Jones: Behind Jonestown. None of these three claim to be complete, although they are all substantive.
   The website also includes a commentary on the authenticity of the death tape, addressing questions raised about the tape's many edits and pauses, as well as Jim Jones' repeated references to U.S. Embassy official Richard Dwyer. The transcripts and commentaries may be found at http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~remoore/jonestown/tapes/death.html.
   
   
8. Army Cannot Locate Records of Bodylift With few limited exceptions, no office or command within the U.S. Army has been able to locate any records of its role during the airlift of bodies from Jonestown to the United States. Despite the documented presence of Army personnel during the operation through the Joint Humanitarian Task Force, most offices and commands within the military service replied to recent Freedom of Information Act requests with findings of "No Record." According to one FOIA caseworker who tried to locate an appropriate office to process one request, the bodylift operation was carried out by personnel who responded to the urgent call for volunteers, acting quickly and without regard for paperwork. Among the commands that found no records are: the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans, the Army Center for Military History, the Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Inter-American Affairs, and the Directorate for Freedom of Information and Security Review, all at the Pentagon; the Special Operations Command at Fort Bragg, North Carolina; the Criminal Investigation Command in Fort Belvoir, Virginia; and the Total Army Personnel Command in Alexandria, Virginia. Requests were also referred to the National Archives, which similarly found no records. The U.S. Army Garrison at Fort Lee, Virginia located and released a four-page memo from December 1978 describing a meeting which discussed the problems encountered during the bodylift. The memo cites the "governing authorities" of the State Department and the FBI, due to the "civilian nature of the disaster," and the role of the Air Force as a directing force, due to its "organizational posture." FOIA requests are still pending before the U.S. Southern Command in Miami, and the U.S. Army South in Fort Buchanan, Puerto Rico The editors of the jonestown report also filed FOIA requests with the two Army bases known to have been involved in the bodylift operation. In early October, the Historian's Office at the U.S. Army Air Defense Artillery Center at Fort Bliss, Texas reported the discovery of "one very small [undated] entry in a history of 1978." The paragraph listed eight soldiers from Fort Bliss, headed by an acting assistant for the Army Graves Registration Task Force, who went to Dover AFB to assist in identifying the bodies of the Jonestown dead. Officials at the second base, Fort McClellan in Alabama, could find no records. In addition, we recently filed an FOIA request with the Department of Veterans Affairs for copies of any psychological evaluations or disability claims made by military personnel as a result of their involvement in the bodylift. That request is currently pending before the agency. Finally, we filed a request with the National Personnel Records Center for the service records of former Army Sgt. Jeff Brailey, whose book, The Ghosts of November, describes his participation in the bodylift. That request, filed with the cooperation of Mr. Brailey, is also pending.
   
   
9. Dover Air Force Base Finds 34 Pages
   The public information office at Dover Air Force Base has released 34 pages of documents related to the airlift of bodies from Jonestown to the United States. The military chose the air base in Delaware to receive the bodies due to its previous experience in processing over 500 victims of an airplane crash at Tenerife in the Canary Islands in 1977.The release includes 26 pages of After Action reports which summarize the problems, solutions and recommendations for improvement which various agencies at the air base faced. The reports cover environmental health, engineering, medical, and religious components of the operation.
   The other eight pages which Dover Air Force Base released pursuant to this request consist of magazine and newspaper articles, and a December 13, 1978 press release from Delaware Governor Pierre duPont asking for removal of the bodies to California.
   
   
10. Jonestown Records Expunged, Lost
    With the passage of time, many primary source documents which the federal government once maintained on Peoples Temple have been expunged or lost. The editors of the jonestown report first learned of this several years ago, when we asked the Social Security Administration for any records the agency might have generated since our initial request in 1979. Not only could the agency not locate records responding to our request, but it reported that its original files had been destroyed. As a result, the only known copy in existence of the Social Security Administration's payments to members of Peoples Temple is in the Moore Family Papers collection at the California Historical Society in San Francisco.
    
    That is not the only agency to have lost or destroyed its documents. The congressional committee which investigated Congressman Ryan's assassination reported in 1979 that the NBC television network turned over all of its video of Jonestown to the Justice Department. The tapes included the raw footage of Ryan's visit to Jonestown, as well as the shootings at the Port Kaituma airstrip. Despite the historical (and, initially, evidentiary) value of the tapes, though, the Justice Department reported that it is no longer able to locate them.
    
    In 2000, we filed a request with the State Department that asked for review of the secret records which the agency turned over to Congress in 1979, arguing that the passage of time should make them less sensitive to classification. As part of our request, we enclosed the table of contents of the congressional report, highlighting the notations of the records which were in the classified version.
    
    Earlier this year, State informed us that it could not identify the documents we were after, based upon the information we had provided. The record systems from the period are antiquated and no longer in use, and there is no current record of what the State Department may have sent to Congress. Absent a listing of the documents or identification of them in some other way, all the papers the State Department sent to Congress are classified in perpetuity, secret, apparently, even to the State Department itself.
    
    In addition, as new generations of FOIA caseworkers unfamiliar with their agencies' records of Peoples Temple come along, and as the people with the institutional knowledge of older record-keeping systems retire, their offices are finding it increasingly difficult to identify government documents in response to FOIA requests for records from 1978.
    
    The federal government is not alone in destroying old records. In an effort to learn federal tax identification numbers for the various corporate entities of Peoples Temple, we contacted the tax authorities for the states of Indiana and California. Indiana reported no record of any corporate entity listed as Peoples Temple, the Peoples Temple Apostolic Church, or the Wings of Deliverance, even though internal Temple records refer to itself by these corporate names. The Indiana Secretary of State did acknowledge the corporate identity of the Jim-Lu-Mar Corporation (named after Jim Jones, his mother Lynetta and his wife Marceline), but said the corporation was "administratively dissolved" on January 1, 1970. The files on the corporation have been purged, the office noted, and no hard copy of records exists.
    The California Franchise Tax Board provided a set of incorporation tax records for one of the many corporate names under which the Temple was doing business. The remaining entities -- including the additional listings of Valley Enterprises and the Apostolic Corporation -- have left no records.
    
    
11. FOI Updates
    In addition to the government documents which the editors of the jonestown report have obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, we have numerous requests that are still pending. While we will report on those releases in future editions, we also invite readers who are interested in particular requests to contact us directly so we may keep you informed of developments as they occur.
    
    Central Intelligence Agency: In the early 1980's, in compliance with a court ruling on a lawsuit filed by the editors of the jonestown report, the CIA released a small number of heavily-redacted documents on Jonestown. We have now asked for reconsideration of the earlier decisions to withhold much of the material. The new request notes the passage of time since November 1978, the deaths of numerous U.S. Embassy officials in the intervening years, and then-President Clinton's 1994 Executive Order pledging greater openness of government records.
    Status: The CIA denied a request for a public interest fee waiver on this request. We have amended the request to meet CIA criteria for a fee waiver. A decision on that request is currently pending.
    
    Internal Revenue Service: The IRS decision of February 1978 to investigate the tax-exempt status of Peoples Temple did more than add fuel to the Jonestown community's belief in a government conspiracy against it; the decision represented a tangible threat to its financial stability. Our request seeks all IRS records related to the initial approval of the tax-exempt status, and the subsequent investigation reviewing that approval.
    Status: The IRS has asked for identifying information, such as the Temple's Employer Identification Number, which we have been unable to furnish. Efforts to get this number from the states of Indiana and California have proven unsuccessful, and we would certainly appreciate any assistance that any of our readers could provide. In the meantime, the request is temporarily on hold.
    
    Department of Justice: In response to public outrage over the death of Leo Ryan at the Port Kaituma airstrip, the Justice Department prosecuted and convicted one man of conspiracy to kill a Congressman. This request seeks all government records related to the trials of Larry Layton.
    Status: The request is currently before the Criminal Division of the Justice Department. The division's FOI office has asked for the records from other divisions as well -- including the Office of International Affairs, and Violent Crime and Terrorism -- before it begins to process the request. It is still pending.
    
    National Archives: Realizing that many federal government agencies may have turned over old records to the National Archives for storage, we recently asked the archives for a copy of any documents related to Peoples Temple and Peoples Temple which may be warehoused there.
    Status: The request is pending.
    
    Department of State (1): Because the State Department issued passports for members of Peoples Temple who emigrated to Guyana, and because those passport records were instrumental in the identification of the Jonestown dead, we have asked the agency for a copy of all passports recovered in Guyana following the deaths in Jonestown.
    Status: The request is still pending.
    
    Department of State (2): While the FBI was responsible for the removal of most records from Jonestown following the mass deaths, one published source claims that an unnamed representative of the U.S. Embassy in Georgetown also removed papers from the encampment during the evacuation of the bodies. We have filed a request for copies of those documents.
    Status: The request is still pending.
    
    
12. Five Major Collections Of FOIA Records Available
    After many years of filing requests under the Freedom of Information Act for documents which federal government agencies have on Peoples Temple and Jonestown, the editors of the jonestown report have uncovered five major collections of records. Those records include over 48,000 pages of documents which the Federal Bureau of Investigation has gathered on three compact disks. The records, which are unindexed, include Peoples Temple documents which the FBI collected at Jonestown following the mass deaths of November 1978, and the records of its investigation into Ryan's assassination. You can request your own set of CD's from the FBI through the following address: Freedom of Information/Privacy Act Section, Office of Public and Congressional Affairs, FBI, Washington, DC 20535-0001. You may get a faster response if your letter notes that the CD's have already been released in response to FOIA Request #902718, filed by Rebecca Moore and Fielding M. McGehee III. The cost of the set of CD's is approximately $30.
    
    Approximately 5000 pages of State Department records which the agency has released on microfiche. As with the FBI's records, the microfiche pages are unindexed, although there are four broad catalogue areas. The largest collection, representing 50 of the 62 microfiche pages, includes raw agency records such as cables between the U.S. and the American Embassy in Guyana and Peoples Temple records gathered by State Department personnel. You can request any or all of the microfiche records through the following address: Office of IRM Programs and Services, Department of State, Room 1512, 2201 C St., N.W., Washington, DC 20520-1512. You may get a faster response if your letter notes that the records have already been released in response to FOIA Request #199804155, filed by Fielding M. McGehee III.
    Four rolls of microfilm which the U.S. Air Force released related to the military's participation in the airlift of bodies from Jonestown in 1978. As with the material from the FBI and State Department, there is no index or guide to the materials, although most of it seems to be related to military activities following the deaths -- such as the body identification processes and airlifting -- rather than any military interest in Peoples Temple prior to November 18, 1978. The microfilm may be obtained directly from the Air Force Historical Research Agency/ISR, 600 Chennault Circle, Maxwell AFB, AL 36112-6424. You may refer to FOIA request #00-0472 filed by Rebecca Moore for faster service. The cost of the microfilm is $30 per roll, or $120 for the entire set. However, the Air Force responded favorably to our request for a fee waiver under the public interest provision of the FOIA.
    
    More than 900 audiotapes recorded by Peoples Temple and FBI recovered by the FBI from Jonestown. All are currently available under FOIA. However, the editors of the jonestown report have over 400 on hand, and will receive the balance of the collection in coming years. You can review the FBI's summaries of the tapes at
    http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/~remoore/jonestown/tapes/fbi.html. This link will also indicate which tapes we have available for duplication, which we have transcribed and summarized, and which were initially withheld from release, pending the trials of Larry Layton.
    
    While the FBI will respond to FOIA requests for individual tapes, you will receive faster service if you order the tapes we have in our possession directly from us. The tapes are $2 each, including shipping. Contact us about the rates for bulk orders.
    Approximately 25 audiotapes which the Federal Communications Commission released to the editors of the jonestown report. The tapes include ham radio transmissions between Temple members, primarily the radio traffic between California and Guyana. This represents all the tapes in the FCC's possession, except for four long tapes recorded at various speeds, and for which the cost of duplication is prohibitive. Most were recorded off air by FCC engineers, and the quality of the audio is sometimes poor. As with the tapes in the FBI's possession, you will receive faster service if you order the FCC's tapes directly from us.
    
    Other federal agencies have had smaller amounts of materials related to Jonestown, and some of those collections have been expunged or mothballed over the years. We suggest that you review this and past editions of the jonestown report before filing FOIA requests to learn of other requestors' experiences with different federal agencies.
    
    
13. Resources At The California Historical Society, by Denice Stephenson Last fall, I agreed to do research on the Peoples Temple files for a Canadian history channel television producer. With a two-day budget, the name of the librarian, and an offer to review (by email) the several hundred-page index of the Peoples Temples collections, I began my short project with an email introduction to Tanya Hollis. By the end of the day, we arranged an appointment for me to visit CHS and to have an overview of the collections
    
    CHS is easy to get to at Third and Mission in downtown San Francisco -- only one bus ride from my flat in San Francisco and kitty corner across the street from the Yerba Buena gardens. The CHS Museum and Bookstore (and beautiful windows) are at the front of the building. Greeted by museum staff at the information desk, I waited for Tanya. She brought me back to the North Baker Research Library -- a quiet room with large worktables, wiring for laptops, comfortable chairs, lots of pencils, and great air. She explained how to request files from the collections and how the library processes copying and photo reproduction orders. She brought me copies of the available indexes to the Temples files. For the remainder of my short visit that day, I reviewed several files from the collections to get an idea of the types of documents available and to try to understand what the indexes really described. I left impressed by the staff and the facility, overwhelmed by the sheer amount of material, and with an appointment for the following week.
    
    The mission for my next visit was to take a list of suggested documents from the television producer, look at the files, take notes, and report back. First step -- request specific files to be pulled by the library's staff. I tried to give them several days' notice for this. When I arrived (by now I knew where to hang my coat and to leave my sweater on), the files were waiting for me at the end of one of the tables. I got to work.
    
    It was not easy going. Though braced to be as matter of fact as possible about the search for specific documents that met the producer's requirements, I found that the papers -- even fairly dry ones such as the land lease documents for Jonestown -- caused me to be confounded, anxious, and emotional. The library's policy to always have a staff member present when people are using the library proved to be a source of comfort as well as informational support. I could not help but blurt out several times, "Will you look at this?" or "What is this?" It turned out that I could withstand only two to three hours at a time. Tanya and Abby (it didn't take long to start learning more names) were agreeable to appointments to review the files even beyond the library's scheduled hours.
    
    For the next month, I visited CHS two times a week. I had the chance to see the rows and rows of boxes (150 related to the Peoples Temple) stored on the first level of the CHS building. The Peoples Temple collections are a unique set of related collections at CHS where most of the other collections date from the gold rush era. By the time the television producer came to film the documents, we were all ready -- with more papers and artifacts than could be filmed in a day.
    
    My short research project took a few more hours than what was originally scheduled, but I continued to feel welcomed and eventually limited myself to only one outburst a day. It's a safe, quiet place to work. And the memories and information that the collections hold are safe, too.
    
    (Ed. Note: Ms. Stephenson continues her volunteer work to organize the CHS collections on Peoples Temple.)
    
    
14. Report From The California Historical Society, by Tanya Hollis
    The North Baker Research Library at the California Historical Society has extensive holdings on Jonestown and Peoples Temple that include manuscripts, records, correspondence, membership files, and photographs.
    
    We are open to the public by appointment only, Wednesdays and Thursdays from 11 am to 5 pm. However, if you are visiting San Francisco from out of town, we often can accommodate you on other days. You may e-mail us at reference@calhist.org, or call us at 415-357-1848 ext 20, for an appointment.
    
    The library at the California Historical Society supports both scholarly research and family-related research in the collection. A generous donation makes it possible for individuals, students, family members and other researchers to use the Peoples Temple-related collections free of charge.
    
    While we do not have the resources to conduct extensive research projects ourselves, we may be able to help you focus on the material you may be seeking, and/or to direct you to researchers in the area familiar with our holdings. We can also help relatives who are searching for photos of family members who died in Jonestown.
    
    There is a finding aid, available on request, to the main collection of the Peoples Temple Records, numbering over 100 boxes. Other related collections include the Moore Family Papers -- which Denice Stephenson is processing to provide additional detail on its contents (see related story, this page) -- and the papers for the lawsuit People v. Briggs from the Office of the Public Defender in San Francisco.
    
    Please visit our website for further information on CHS at www.californiahistoricalsociety.org.
    
    (Tanya Hollis is the Associate Librarian at the California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco 94105, 415/357-1848, ext. 20. Email at: reference@calhist.org.)
    
    
15. Purple Haze: A Video Documentary, by Mary Anne Alton
    "Purple Haze" is a feature documentary on the history of the Jonestown massacre. It chronicles the life of Jim Jones and the Peoples Temple.
    
    The documentary shows the many faces of Reverend Jones. It also shows how he built his power base step-by-step enjoying the support of First Lady Rosalyn Carter and Governor Jerry Brown. Survivors of the events of November 18th, 1978 give incredible detail of what really happened that day deep in the Guyana jungle. Two survivors of the airstrip shooting describe the ambush which killed five people.
    
    The documentary dispels the myth that over 900 Americans willingly committed suicide. The people who died in the Guyana jungle were not crazy people incapable of thinking for themselves. They were mostly middle-class Americans who for one reason or another were searching for something in their life.
    
    The documentary has aired in Canada several times on History Television in a series called "Turning Points of History."
    
    "Purple Haze" was directed and written by Mary Anne Alton an independent producer living in Toronto, Canada. The series "Turning Points" is produced by Barna-Alper Productions in association with Alliance Atlantis. The documentary is available to purchase for broadcast. For more information, contact Alliance Atlantis through Mary Ann Alton at lemm@interlog.com
    
    
16. Obituary
    The editors of the jonestown report have learned of the 1985 death of Joe Mazor, a private detective whom members of the Concerned Relatives hired to try to persuade people to leave Jonestown. Mazor's eventual role was unclear: Jim Jones first denounced him as a spy and a kidnaper, then shouted his triumph when Mazor reportedly switched sides; Mazor said he worked as an impartial liaison between Jonestown and everyone on the outside, including the press
    
    Mazor was shot to death by his wife in November 1985
    
    A listing of obituaries for other people with substantial knowledge of Peoples Temple and Jonestown who have died since 18 November 1978 is available at
    http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/AboutJonestown/WhoDied/whodiedsince_list.htm.
    
    
17. Speakers (in alphabetical order)
    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.
    
    Tim Carter can be contacted at tcarter999@worldnet.att.net. See "Resources" for additional information.
    John R. Hall, Department of Sociology, University of California - Davis, Davis, CA 95616; email jrhall@ucdavis.edu
    Massimo Introvigne, CESNUR - Center for Studies on New Religions, Via Juvarra 20, Torino, Italy 10122; telephone 39-011-541905; email 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; she also maintains the website jonestown.com. See "Resources" for additional information.
    Laura Kohl (a former member of the Temple, known then as Laura Johnston), at lkohl1920@hotmail.com
    Bryan and Christine Kravitz (former members of the Temple) at Kbbsherdt@yahoo.com; phone (650) 345-2056. See "Resources" for additional information.
    Debby Layton can be reached through her websites, which include seductivepoison.com; peoplestemple.com; and deborahlayton.com
    Rebecca Moore, Department of Religious Studies, San Diego State University, 5500 Campanile Drive, San Diego, CA 92182-8143; telephone 619/594-6252; email remoore@mail.sdsu.edu
    Catherine Wessinger, Department of Religious Studies, Loyola University, 6363 St. Charles Avenue, New Orleans, LA 70118; telephone 504/865-3182; email wessing@loyno.edu
    Yulanda (Crawford) Williams can be reached via email at yopopo@mindspring.com. See "Resources" for additional information.
    Leslie Wagner Wilson can be contacted at Ctclescat@aol.com See "Resources" for additional information.
    
    
18. Resources
    
    Please note: some of these email addresses may no longer be operational.
    
    Former Temple member Laurie Efrein Kahalas has a website at www.jonestown.com and is the author of the book, Snake Dance: Unravelling The Mysteries of Jonestown. In a reconstruction of the events of 18 November 1978 Efrein raises questions about who the gunmen at the Port Kaituma airstrip were, whether Jim Jones ordered the assassinations, why the available evidence that challenges the popular interpretation of the Jonestown deaths was never examined, and how the botched autopsies ruined the forensic record and thereby destroyed the last real opportunity to get to the heart of the truth. For this account, see www.jonestown.com/unsilent_night.htm
    
    Yulanda (Crawford) Williams, a former Temple member who left Jonestown in 1978 and who provides a critical view from the African-American perspective, can be reached via email at yopopo@mindspring.com
    
    Leslie Wagner Wilson escaped from Jonestown with her two-year-old son strapped to her back on the morning of the mass deaths, 18 November 1978. Seven others left with her. She describes herself as follows: "Ms. Wilson grew up in Redwood Valley, the heart of the Peoples Temple, from the age of 12, and has a special perspective on life in the organization, the training techniques and the betrayal which led her to Jonestown. She would like to talk about her experiences as a member of an interracial family in Jonestown. Please contact her at Ctclescat@aol.com for more information."
    
    Tim Carter escaped from Jonestown in the final hours with his brother Mike. He has a unique perspective as a resident of Jonestown and as one who survived the deaths on 18 November 1978. He can be contacted at tcarter999@att.net for more information.
    
    Bryan and Christine Kravitz are former Temple members who would like to get in touch with old friends. (Christine's last name in 1978 was Johnson; between 1979 and 1998, she was Christine Tarver.) Contact them at Kbbsherdt@cs.com
    
    
19. Website Update
    A number of changes occurred on the website "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple" this summer. The most visible change is the addition of a search engine to the site. This allows visitors to use key words to search the entire site with ease, and is a tremendous help for anyone looking for specific individuals, such as family members.
    
    We also reorganized the Jonestown Audiotape Primary Project to facilitate identification and access of tape transcripts. Links to transcripts and extended summaries now exist within the FBI tape summary documents, as well as links from summaries to transcripts, and from transcripts to summaries. Tapes are broken down by topic, with a one-line descriptor to help readers see if they'd like to read more. Finally, we added several different complete transcripts of the "death tape," along with a commentary on the tape.
    
    The site added 75 photographs of daily life and the ordinary people of Jonestown. They may be found at http://jonestown.sdsu.edu/AboutJonestown/Gallery/gallery_2.htm. The photographs are among the 500 which the FBI collected from the site of the tragedy in 1978.
    
    Transcripts and photographs are all in the public domain, and may be used freely. We would, of course, appreciate credit for whatever materials you obtain from the site for your use.
    
    
20. SDSU Offers Support To Jonestown Research
    The Department of Religious Studies at San Diego State University is supporting a number of research projects into Peoples Temple and Jonestown. It is the chief institutional sponsor of the Peoples Temple Oral History Project and of the website "Alternative Considerations of Jonestown and Peoples Temple" (http://jonestown.sdsu.edu).
    
    Faculty in the department are also working with librarians at SDSU's Love Library and Special Collections to create permanent housing for tapes gathered under the oral history project, as well as government documents released under the federal Freedom of Information Act.
    
    SDSU's interest in Peoples Temple is related to development of a Center for the Study of Religion and Culture, to be sponsored by the Department of Religious Studies. Three departmental projects -- Jonestown research, the Institute for Druze Studies, and archaeological study in Israel -- will eventually comprise the center.