Here's a story maybe some of you young ones have never heard before, gather round the Speaker of the Deep, and hear this tale.... On November 18, 1978 Members of the Peoples Temple we're gathered in the communal pavilion of "Jonestown" an agricultural commune in the Jungles of Guyana. Lead by the charismatic and strange Jim Jones. Documentaries have been made about this moment when he and 909 of his followers committed ritual suicide, or were murdered when they ingested Flavor-Aid (a Kool-aid knock-off) laced with Cyanide, and Valium. There were rumored to be only 2 survivors The story of the Peoples Temple and the Jonestown Massacre is a murky one, made up of mostly personal accounts of people who were connected with the Peoples Temple, letters and written accounts left behind by the now dead congregation, and audio and video taken during a fateful visit by a US congressman and Teacher, Leo Ryan, in which the Senator and people who attempted to leave with him, were gunned down in cold blood, as they began boarding the small ariplane that would carry them back to the US. The Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ was founded in Indianapolis Indiana in 1955. It was billed as a faith based around the ideals of Christianity married to the ideals of Communist and Socialist Philosophy. Anyone who came to the peoples Temple was welcome and it featured a strong emphasis on racial equality, something that was not commonly accepted, in the era of the budding and blossoming civil rights movements of the 50's and 60's. Jim Jones was a charismatic individual who delivered fiery sermons peppered with his ideologies and staged "miracles". Jim Jones even rose to certain political influence, after spreading his message and establishing locations throughout California, gaining a seat on the San Francisco Housing Authority Commission and eventually becoming the chairman. Rumors abounded about humiliations and sexual assaults in the Peoples Temple, with one incident when a member of the congregation was instructed to strip naked as others ogled and judged the womans appearance for an offense; all under the watchful eye of the Reverend Jones. Fleeing the media scrutiny and a potential police crackdown he took approximately 900 of his followers to the Jungles of Guyana where the Temple had leased and constructed a commune, that he described as a paradise of socialism. The reality according to some journals left behind was much different, the jungle soil was thin and crops did not take well, and sweltering summers coupled with insect infestations and plagues of mosquitoes were common. And Jones maintained his own security force to guard the compound and keep people from escaping. The November 18th Massacre has been studied many times, but it is believed that Congressmen Leo Ryan's visit was the catalyst for the mass murder suicide. The Democratic Congressman had a legacy of experiential legislating rising quickly as the Mayor of southern San Francisco, and serving less than a year before being elected to the california state assembly. He took a job as a substitute teacher after the Watts riots of 1965 to document the conditions there, and stayed 10 days as an inmate of Folsom Prison while serving on the committee overseeing prison reform. After arriving he was presented with- what was revealed later to be- a well-rehearsed event for his benefit, and all was going well until someone attempted to pass him a note, saying they wanted to leave but were not allowed to. The attitudes of the congregation and their reverend Jim Jones changed. And an indoctrinated member of the cult stabbed the congressmen, those who wanted to leave were taken to the airstrip where they and the Congressman were murdered in a hail of gunfire. When the sun rose the next day 909 people, including the Rev. Jim Jones were dead. The infamous "death tape" catalogues in horrifying reality, what had occured, it is believed that Jim Jones edited by pausing the tape to avoid recording the screams of those forcibly injected with the cyanide concoction. Many more willing "Drank the Kool-aid" and died in the frothing convulsions of Cyanide poisoning. I have included a link to the archived death tape [url=https://archive.org/details/ptc1978-11-18.flac16]here[/url]; [u]do not listen[/u] if you are easily disturbed. I have heard this euphemism used many times to describe blind or misguided devotion- it is quite a story to uncover, and the deeper you go in the horrific legend of Jim Jones, the more twisted a mind you find. But then again, I always strive to go just one. layer. [i]DEEPER[/i] (@_@) [spoiler]Information about the Jonestown massacre is readily available online, and in numerous publications. the information presented here represents but a fraction of the story... don't just take my word for it[/spoiler]