Today, we will try to present you a very interesting topic and we will talk about an area that is very interesting and that will give you some new information. We will also talk about a very well-known person from ours history.

In our themes you can find many interesting stories and information and in each of our texts we will make every effort to get all the necessary information about different types of art and famous people.

Today we will talk about Jim Jones a man who has left a great mark in American religion but also in politics and has managed to make many different things in life. Different opinions were spoken about him, but the fact is that while he was in the mayor’s role he was very good in that job and he helped many people in that city.

During his life and career he managed to achieve many different goals and managed to get a large number of followers.

Early Years

Jim Jones was born on May 13, 1931 in Linn, Indiana, USA. Jim Jones grew up in an environment of racial segregation and Christian fundamentalism. His father James Jones was ill with the gases that he breathed into the trenches in World War I and he has been fan of Ku Klux Klan but he did not have information how to get membership in group.

His mother, Lynette Jones, was a worker who gives all the love and care for her son and she always was a good mother.  She also transferred love for the animals to Jim Jones.

In his childhood Jones had often picked up animals from the street, and it seemed that he knew from a young age that he wanted to be a preacher, because he had already delivered preacher dogs to neighbor’s children in his hometown. Jones has said that Pentecostalism to which he was exposed as a child was a major influence in his life.

As far as his childhood was calm and he was good boy, in later period he indicated a certain fanaticism such as placing a cow in the Bible or arguing when he disagreed with certain people that he considered hypocritical. In that environment and city, Jones developed concern for two areas that has followed him throughout his life: racial integration and socialism.

Career

According to interviews with his wife, at the time when they were married in 1949, Jones had already been committed by a communist. He was considered Maoist, but he sympathized with Stalin and the Soviet Union.  Jim Jones spoke of his ideology as a religious socialism or apostolic socialism. Later, socialism becomes in its ideology “the Almighty God, Socialism”. In 1959, he had his son Stephen Jones and he adopted other children of various races which he called “the family of the rainbow”.

In 1960, the temple of the people was accepted into a Christian church, the Disciples of Christ, giving him more prestige (this was the church founded in 1830) and was consecrated priest of the Disciples of Christ.

In 1969, the Temple of the Nations moved to the Redwood Valley, California, and during that time, Jones knew lawyer Timothy Stoen who was integrated into the Jones Church as a leader and who in the next period of time would have a major impact on the ultimate success of the Temple. In one later interview he said that Stoen wanted Jones to be the father of his son (the most honest, brave and merciful man in the world), and Jones needed to sleep with Stoen’s wife, Grace.

But when Stoen left the National Temple, a lawsuit was ready for his son, John Victor Stoen, who was with Jones in Jonestown. Jones said that he was his “biological” son and that he was not willing to change his minds. All this litigation has affected one the progress of Jones’ paranoia and his ideas for a suicide exit.

But since then, the Temple of Nations has perceived the press as an enemy. In 1973, eight members of the leading positions in the Temple left the city, and this was the answer to this fact that Jones first began to talk about collective suicide as a defensive strategy in order to avoid attacks on the movement.

At the beginning of the 70’s the temple had between 3,000 and 5,000 members (The temple had said that there were about 20,000). Jim Jones was heavily involved in San Francisco’s politics. He supported George McCone as a candidate in 1975, and because of that Jones was rewarded with the position of president of the San Francisco. The truth is that Jones has done a great job in everything that concerns housing and cares for the poor and he also helped many people and animals and he won several awards for his humanitarian work.

The magazine Religion in Life named him one of the 100 most important pastors in 1975. Los Angeles Herald awarded him with the “Humanitarian of the Year” award in 1976 and he was one of four winners with “Martin Luther King, Jr. “Humanitarian of the year”.

Because of this feeling of persecution and fear of the nuclear apocalypse, Jones began to think about moving his community to another place. He met Guyana on his return from Brazil, where he was in the sixties, and then started negotiating with the government of Guyana, and in March 1974 the first members of the temple arrived in Guyana.

The Government of Guyana gave them a land of 3,000 acres, and in June 1974, a group of 15 members had already begun to clear the jungle. In 1975, there were already 50 members of the Temple in Guyana. It must be said that the Temple of the Nations was not the only religious group that settled in Guyana; there was also a small group called the Group of East, led by Les Campbell and two other groups called Hashabah Israel, led by two New York masters and the Israeli House headed by David Hill.

On August 1, 1977, a very critical article about the Temple of the Nation appeared in the New West, which says it should be investigated for forced actions, abuse of members, financial crimes and its impact on the San Francisco because of which Jones decides to go to Guyana, and in September 1977 he already has 1,000 members in Jonestown. In the demographic composition and information of this community, at that time there were 75% are black, 20% white and 5% Hispanic, Asian and Indians peoples. About two-thirds are women, nearly 300 are under 18 and 150 are over 65.

During 1978, Timothy Stoen and the “traitors” of the Temple – grouped in the Committee of Endangered Relatives – pressured to restore custody of their son, as well as investigate abuses and press Congress. In the end, Congressman Ryan, a representative of the San Mateo County in northern California, decided to investigate Jonestown and arrive on November 17, 1978. They showed him the city, but at night they receive a request from 14 dissatisfied people who want to leave Jonestown. In the next day, he back to the airport to leave Jonestown.

Infiltrated Larry Laiton, who was Jim Jones security, went among journalists and believers and went to the United States and after that he infiltrated into a group that kills Congressman Ryan and three journalists. After that moment Jones realizes that there was the end and that they will come for him in close time.

In the past months, Jones had talks with the Soviet consul to go to Russia, but that was impossible in that time. He was very disappointed, and after that Jones gives an order to commit suicide that was something previously trained and called “white nights”. The idea of ​​collective suicide often appeared in Jonestown in recent months, and Jones threatened his enemies as a way to turn his followers against them.

The fact is that the suicide destroyed many lives r and the life of the Jonestown, including dogs, fish and animals on the farms, is gone. 914 people die, 260 children, a citizen of Guyana and 913 Americans. We also must add that in the premises of the Temple of Peoples in the capital Guyana, Georgetown, Sharon Amos, with the help of another member of the Temple, kills his three children and makes suicide. Another bizarre story is a reversal that gave the bodies of these people for months (no one wanted them) until they were buried at a cemetery in California. Everyone physically and mentally distanced themselves from this event, nobody wanted to have anything to do with him.

Personal Life

When we talk about some details of his private life, we can say that many people had different opinions, but the fact is that while he was in the mayor’s role he was very good in that job and he helped many people in that city. During his life and career he managed to achieve many different goals and managed to get a large number of followers.

During his speeches he managed to transfer knowledge, but also to motivate people and his followers. His speeches and statements were written down. During his lifetime, he many times changed his partners and said that it was not a sin and that he is a man from God.

He had some speeches like “There are many testimonies of happiness that you are part of that experience to be part of something bigger than yourself”. Jones’s speech was not just a message, this was message that explained many things about his life. In tapes that are studied in many organizations you can hear his words and you can hear applause, encouragement and support from the audience.

Jones also said “You cannot detach from your brother and sister and everything is connected.” The symbolic universe that generated the speech of Jim Jones was the common property of all those who died in collective suicide. The revolutionary act was a symbolic affirmation of the thousands of people who said, “We do not like the world as it is”.

Quick Summary

Full Name: Jim Jones

Birthplace: Linn, Indiana, USA

Date of birth: May 13, 1931

Age: /

Profession: Politician, Religion leader

Height: 183 cm

Weight: 90 kg

Net Worth:  NA