Peoples Temple Radio:
An Archived Site

One of the least examined aspects of Peoples Temple’s history was its relationship with the Federal Commiunications Commission (FCC). The relationship was also an important one: Jonestown’s only medium of direct and immediate communication with the outside world was through its HAM amateur radio; the Concerned Relatives oppositional group knew of the Temple’s use of its HAM radio – and of its misuses as well, such as conducting Temple business on its bandwidths – and alerted the FCC of the violations; and HAM operators around the US started reporting their own experiences with communications from Jonestown. With all these considerations in mind, history student and HAM operator Josef Dieckman launched a website to document all aspects of Jonestown radio. The site was active for several years in the first decade of the 2000s before going offline. This website has restored as much of the site as has been possible to do, and has archived it below.

Restored Pages

Some of the links within these articles are no longer operational and have been disabled.

Additional Info

This letter was sent to a ham radio operator in Tennessee who had written Jeannie Mills about his own investigation into the Temple's use of amatuer radio in Guyana. The TN op, (who I have had some limited contact with) had made many tapes and was (and still may be) trying to put together a book about the topic.

This letter is intersting because Mills provides the code names for many of the operators in the Temple. The list is not complete, however. Several significant operators are missing from the list such as the Carter brothers, Paula Adams, Laura Johnston, and (prior to May, 1978) Deborah Layton.

In the letter, Mills also refers to the tape recordings she made of Temple radio transmissions. Fielding McGehee and I both believe these tapes to part of one of the more recent  donations to the California Historical Society. I have seen these tapes...many are already transcribed. However, due to their age, their "playability" is suspect. McGehee is currently negotiationg with CHS to aquire copies of these tapes.
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