I am the son of Lela Howard and the nephew of Mary Pearl Willis. By now I\u2019m sure you have heard this name, either in the jonestown report<\/i> or somewhere in the news. But they can only tell you so much, like what happened, and how it ended. In my opinion, you must hear the perspective of people who were affected by this. I\u2019m sure many of you wonder how a sixteen-year-old could be affected by this terrible tragedy, but believe me, this had a huge impact on me as well as a hard lesson.<\/p>\n
My mom and I got involved in researching Jonestown one night in late September 2006. My mom was having a conversation with my grandmother, and somehow it led to Aunt Pearl. My grandmother and my mom had talked about Aunt Pearl in the past, but no one really wanted to go very far with it, which I really didn\u2019t understand. And then, my mom began to cry. I asked her, \u201cWhy do you always cry, whenever you talk about Aunt Pearl?\u201d Mom said \u201cI don\u2019t know, but I\u2019m going to find out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Our research took us to this website, and we found out that Stanley Nelson\u2019s film, Jonestown: The Life and Death of Peoples Temple,<\/i> would be shown at UCLA. I really loved the documentary, and it taught me a lot, but there were many times when Mom began to cry. At the end of the film, when the director invited former Temple members and relatives of the Jonestown dead who were in the audience to come forward to speak in a question-and-answer session, she went up to the front of the theater, a move that surprised everyone, including myself! After she spoke and answered a few questions, you wouldn\u2019t believe how many people went up and asked her questions. I had to get in line to get to my own mother! Even outside the theater people kept asking her questions. Before Mom and I left UCLA, someone came up to us and told us this same documentary was going to be played at the Nuart Theater in L.A. in a couple days. Wow! I really didn\u2019t know Jonestown or the documentary itself was this big.<\/p>\n
Going to the Nuart Theater was fun, and we got to meet the director, Stanley Nelson. He was a nice guy, but of course we had to ask him to explain why all previous movies showed Jonestown as a \u201cbunch of crazy people in a cult.\u201d One good thing about going to the Nuart was the people, how different they were from those at the UCLA screening, which after all had been mainly film majors and other college students. A lot of regular filmgoers showed up for this feature. They were able to ask questions, voice their opinions \u2013 and of course there were few who disagreed with other people \u2013 and a lot more people talked after the showings. I remember during the very first showing I kind of felt the like one of those people on that show Entourage<\/i> because I had been seated next to two people, Rebecca Moore and Fielding McGehee, who were in the movie. The showings at the Nuart were all fun; I just miss educating people who were much older than me.<\/p>\n
Mom and I also went to the Bay Area for November\u2019s memorial service, and met a bunch of other Temple members, survivors and relatives. That was good too. But after all, that a huge bombshell dropped on Mom and me.<\/p>\n
A couple of nights after the showings, the Aunt Pearl\u2019s daughter told us that her mother didn\u2019t have a headstone on her grave. We were shocked and appalled, and of course, curious. I sure as heck would have got my mom a headstone, I\u2019m sure you would\u2019ve got a headstone for your parents. After all the smoke cleared, Mom and I realized, we had a mission. The following Monday, Mom called the cemetery where Aunt Pearl was buried. The first question the guy on the phone asked us was, \u201cIs she buried on the black or white side\u201d? Mom was angered to hear that and so was I. But you have to remember Louisiana is in the south, and a lot of things happened down there back in 1979 that wouldn\u2019t happen today. The man put Mom on hold while he went to look for the spot where Aunt Pearl was buried. When he came back, he told Mom he couldn\u2019t find the grave, but she could call back in a few hours. When she did, the other bombshell was dropped: The man said he couldn\u2019t find the grave. Mom was shocked and angered. When I came home from school that day, she told me the terrible news. I was disgusted: how can someone\u2019s grave be lost? Or better yet, how come no one in the family ever purchased a headstone? Once I started asking a few questions about that, everyone in the family began pointing fingers at one another. My grandma blamed my mom\u2019s mentally-ill aunt, while other family members like Aunt Pearl\u2019s daughter said they tried, but there was nothing they could do.<\/p>\n
Mom had to go back to the beginning. She talked to our family who lives down there in Monroe, Louisiana and who had attended her funeral. These questions lingered in both our minds: \u201cIf everyone was at the funeral, how come no one bought a headstone? How could family just forget about Aunt Pearl?\u201d After a few days, Mom decided to call the Monroe City Hall and talk to the people in charge of cemeteries. I\u2019m pretty sure she didn\u2019t like hearing that sanitation was in charge of the cemetery where Aunt Pearl was buried, but worse, the people in the department didn\u2019t call Mom back. A couple of days after that, Mom wrote a letter to the governor of Louisiana.<\/p>\n