>> thank you on the train too. it's been a pleasure to talk with you today. congratulations on your book. it's an extraordinary almost historical thriller. even though we know the outcome, it really keeps you turning the pages. >> tina. >> that was "after words" and without there's a the latest nonfiction books are a few paternalist, public policymakers, legislators and others familiar with the material. "after words" airs at 10:00 p.m. on saturday, 12:00 and 9:00 p.m. and 12:00 a.m. on monday. you can watch afterwards online. go to booktv.org and click on "after words" and the topics list on the upper right side of the page. >> next, julia scheeres present a story of jim jones and the people temple, church that attracted hundreds to kiana, 909

members died in congressman leo ryan was assassinated on november 181978. it is about an hour. >> thanks for coming out on a random ones they might. i really appreciate it. i apologize for my voice. i have a cold that i caught from a 2-year-old. but anyway, again, this is the book and it came out two weeks ago. jesus land, my first book was my relationship with my doctor but brother, david, growing up several times at indiana and be sent out to a reform school in the dominican republic. they were oddly parallels between the two books as far as race and kind of the law need to equate straight society, which religion.

and also being sent away. and i think especially when i got to the part of writing about jonestown and how secluded and isolated in cutting off from the world that the jonestown residents work, i i could really empathize with those people. and oddly enough, there were some punishments used in jonestown are similar to punishment used in my reform school. for example, people ran away from reform school day had their heads shaved or they were put on something called learning support, where they had to run from place to place. so that was kind of interesting to see those parallels. the book has its origin. i was actually writing a novel, kind of a satirical novel about a charismatic preacher who takes over the small indiana town. i'm from indiana. and i thought about jim jones, and other hoosier. and so i googled him and learned

that the fbi had released all of the documents that they found in jamestown and that no one had used this to crack the book. and so, what happened was, for those that don't know, after a congressman from san mateo, california, which is south of here, decided to go down to jamestown to investigate claims before being hauled against their will. and as he was leaving, a group of people from jonestown decided to join in. they wanted out. and so, jim jones knew that the tape was that once those people gave up and came to the state they were going to tell people about conditions in jonestown. so what he did for his second security guards on this departing party as they were reading at this jungle airstrip and they killed congressman ryan and members of the people that were leaving.

so, the fbi goes in. it's a federal investigation. congressman leo ryan is the first congressman killed in the line of duty in u.s. history. the fbi goes into jonestown after they clear the body and they just are collecting documents as evidence, trying to figure out what the happened. with their conspiracy to kill the congressman? and they go through, literally, picking from letters never sent home, diaries, beating us. they collect 50,000 pieces of paper. and that would be like -- i don't know, i figured 150, 300 page novels are you so that's basically the material i was working on it. and a lot of it when i started working with the base, have labored to it, couldn't read anything. and then as i was about to turn the book in, they released a redacted versions of the document. so i took another six months to read through and i can finally see who is doing what, who was

ordering cyanide, who is planning to kill everyone. so that was kind of interesting. so i'm going to just read here -- well first, i guess i should assign the structure of the book. 918 people died in guy on it that day, so my way and, since anyone knows how jonestown and, was to take five different people who represent different demographics that were tracked it to jim jones. and so, you have, for example, a middle-aged white women, college educated. and so, you have, for example, a middle-aged white women, college educated. and so, you have, for example, a middle-aged white women, college educated and was progressive and really wanted to do something to help the causes of, college educated and was progressive and really wanted to do something to help the causes of minorities and african-americans and was drawn to jim jones church, which at the time was really seen as this progressive force, as they

moved me a cisco. so if you have her one and not the spec dram come at the other end you have seen the clayton, this african-american young man from oakland who was brought up in a broken home, angry, so everything in racial terms. and for him, jim jones method without a quality in establishing this utopia where there'd be no racism or isn't worthy to some. i mean, they really so sweetly on his years. and so, he was drawn to jim jones church. so you know, it wasn't just blocks, wasn't just wise. it was this mix of people who really wanted to do something to improve social this. another person i follow through as tommy bowe, who was sent down to jonestown as a teenager kind of like i was sent down to my reform school as a teenager to straighten me out. he was sent to jonestown to

straighten coming you know, to get straightened out. he was skipping class and not going to church. he was sent there to isolate them from negative peers and i really bonded with tommy. one thing people don't realize is that a third of the people who died in a jonestown massacre were minors. so that's another good. what is it like to be in a church just because your parents remember them from jones down and have no say in the matter. and then, i also profile his father. so it's tommy bowe, jim bo, stanley clayton, the young man from oakland. edith ruler who were -- worked as a secretary. admin two sisters from alabama. hyacinth rash and zipper adverts.

he joined jones church back in indianapolis. and they joined in the 50s in indianapolis. when jim jones first started people's temple and was at the cutting edge of the civil rights movement they are. he was integrating his church. he was integrating lunch counters. he was going to hospitals and integrating hospitals. you know, they were really drawn to his message of equality. they saw him on television one sunday. to turn on the television, sun has integrated choir and this young preacher inviting people of all colors to come to his church. into them, it was a revelation. so they end up in jones town. so through the book, introduce you to these different people. hopefully become emotionally attached to them and you understand a little bit more why it was that people ended up in jonestown. you know, i think one of the

hopes i have for this book is that it changes perceptions about what happened, that the people who went -- bless you -- you know, it is so easy now for people to denounce john fick comes as cold this and baby killers and even susan jacoby who is a respected cultural historian recently called him in her book the psychotic kool-aid drinkers of jones town. well, i hope this book challenges this notion similarly set the record straight about how trapped people were jonestown and how isolated and there is no way out. and that's what i found in these documents. i found it heartbreaking letters from dozens of letters from people to jim jones saying i want to go home. i had no idea it was like this. please. my children are scared. just let me go home.

he would let anybody leave. an essential argument may both in what i discovered in my research is that he was planning to kill his followers for years before he brought them to jonestown. he taught that loading them into buses and driving the buses off the court and it ridge. he talked about loading them onto an airplane crashing into the ocean. and of course, the rank-and-file members have no idea that the secret conversations were going on. it was his inner circle who tended to be these young white, depressed, nihilistic people that kind of reflect to disown carrot there. so i think that is the most heartbreaking thing about what happened at jonestown is that the rank-and-file who went down there, you know, the court come in the inner city, the progressives went down to jonestown, thinking they were going to partake in this great social experiment that they were

going to stay for a month. they were going to send kids off for a semester abroad and then they would come home. and once they got down there, jim jones took away their passports, their money and said no one is going home. no one can leave. and that is the most chilling thing i found in my research. in the year before the massacre, he is starting to talk to them about the fact that some day they are going to commit revolutionary suicide. someday they are going to die to protest capitalism. and when he first brings this up, people are likely to second. he didn't come down here to die. we came down here to give our children a better life. and they would argue with him night after night. he would hold these meetings in the pavilion at jonestown and it may, we want to defend their community. we want to live. and you have to read the book,

but you know, eventually he was able to break it down by depriving him of food, of slate, by telling him they were surrounded by mercenaries in the jungle who are about to come in and torture the children. and he had his conspiracies. he had his son going to the jungle and shoot back at the camp to seem like there were people in the jungle about to attack. so just the amount of planning that went into that final night or just astounding to me. the methodical nature of his raking down their power, their willpower, verify, their psychological resistance to him. so i'm going to read to you really briefly about the first

time he brings out the ikea of the revolutionaries whose site. by the way, i should say, he renewed, the cofounder of the plot cantor wrote and not a biography called revolutionary suicide. and what he meant that term is not the oppressed people should not be passed if it they are attacked by police or the oppressors. they should go down fighting that is going down passively. zero, jim jones took this is heated to mean that we are going to commit mass suicide to promote capitalism. he really took he renewed his words and twisted them into some in altogether different. all right. for this happens on december 9, 1977, a year before the actual

attack. on december 9, jim jones mother died of emphysema and john town. a few hours after her death, and emotional jones summoned his followers to the pavilion. he described his mother's last moment as he gasped for air with her tongue hanging out in saliva throwing down her face. he invited people who knew and that are about to take a last look at her. although she looked terrific while she died, he said that in death she looked very well, very well indeed. then that it was a one-person job so i call his bluff and get away with it. in john's town, when she overheard him bragging about shooting wild turkey with a pistol at 200 carrot distance, she laughed and called over her daughter-in-law. that man didn't shoot any turkey. anyone knows you can't shoot anything with a pistol from 200 yards. when she died, her moderating

influence vanished and another court tethering jones two reasons not. a few weeks later in the middle of the rambling screen, he abruptly asked his followers, how many of you plan your deaths? there was a stunned silence. don't you ever plan your deaths he repeated impatiently? is a member of you that do not list your hand and say that you plan your debts. you're going to die. don't you think you should plan such an important event? he called on a 75-year-old vitale. mr. talley, don't you ever plan your deaths? on a tape recorded the conversation, she sounded hesitant. no she said finally. and why don't you, dear? jones asked. i don't know. i just haven't thought about it.

don't you think it's time to think about it? it's a terrible thing to have it be an accident. i saw my mother to be wasted and displayed in the back. it's kind of the waste, don't you think? the old woman was confused. she got jones was talking about life insurance. my husband quit paying and i didn't have no money to pay it and i just let it go and hunt to know more about it. i'm not talking uninsurance jones said. i'm typing up sending your debts for the area the people, for socialism, communism, press operation. haven't you ever thought about taking a bombing run into a kook left and reading and destroying other people? a microphone buzz loudly, angering jones. he ordered the people sit at the back to saplings their babies and pay attention.

my times, any-year-old biracial girl with soft black air racer and. she too was confused. what does planning your debts mean she asked sweetly? on tape, her voice is shockingly innocent and clear. in response to matt, jones launched into a diatribe whose essence is captured in this sentence. a healthy person has to think through his death or he may follow. this is jim jones deepest fear that his followers would sell out or betray him if they left his church. he'd rather they died first. when somebody so principal they are ready to die at the snap of a finger he told his followers. and that's what i want to build menu, that same type of care through. they begin typing that various methods of nine.

drowning is one of the easiest ways in the world to die. it is just a numbing kindness a decent nation. the crowd was solemn and their lack of enthusiasm infuriated him. so many people get so funky nervous every time i talk about death he shouted. he stuck at this down and and pretend that you cannot just set the seen his mother to a she died. the crowd laughed uneasily. motherly woman refused to smile and he turned on her. you're going to die someday, honey bella. you will, you're going to die. this is taken from audiotape in jonestown. the fbi collected about a thousand nokia tapes that i was able to use for the first time.

and you know, i can't imagine being in that crowd that night when all of a sudden this man who you respect it, this preacher, this progressive figure and from disco politics is suddenly saying, unique to plan your death and bellowing out an old woman, calling her names. i can imagine what that would then like sitting there with your child and hearing this conversation. so again, that is what i hope people take away from it took us a better understanding of what happened in john's town and how to trap these people were. he told another tape, you know, has him saying that the people who want to leave were not going to pay your acting way home.

if you want to go home, you can swim home. over and over he's telling me know what going home. wow going to be here and i together. and the thing is, i went down there in 2008 and is so isolated even today. in the 70s, people had to take a two-day boat trip up jungle river to get there. and there was no phone. there is a hand radio, that he controlled to use it. he censored all of the mail going out. and that is another heart pretending that the fbi agents recovered or all of these letters that were never given to residents, saying to me know, sell and sell need to come home. mom is dying and she wants to see before she goes. please. they were never given these letters. in the letters -- their relatives or loved ones in the family were never delivered

either. so i just hope again by reading this people would need a better understanding and the phrase drinking the kool-aid is so offensive. i mean, most people have heard that phrase, the most young people and especially people born after 1980 have no idea where comes from, that it originates from the horrific event in jonestown. so maybe after reading this book , that won't be bandied about as quickly as it is now. anyway, i think to open up for questions. yes. [applause] [inaudible] >> about 30 years ago, i went to, and did a piece for atlantic

on garage niche. and so i'm a little more cynical than you are. i really feel it for the children who suffered this. in terms of the adult as they said, i assume people succumb to the twin ideologies which have been so harmful to many people come the ideologies of religion couple of the ideology of politics. and another in psalms pretty difficult pill and can be quite destructive put them together is jones did. and you've got a proof it is extremely distract you. the question i have for you -- the good and just leafing quickly through your boat, i see a lot of people here saying% to were involved in helping to create this image is jones being an honorable and good and revolutionary person, including moscow and eight, harvey milk,

sorry they really hope and and he deserves our scorn for that. believe brown was involved in it. and then better still like angela davis and she renewed. ntp essays news department, which never ceased to praise jones because they saw him as a fellow ideologue who profess that they did here so the question i have for you is have you gone to any of these prominent people and asked them how they could justify creating the myth of james jones that is led so many who proper, including people like angela davis who should hang your head in shame. >> jones had wings a lot of people. he cut -- you know, the politicians came to peoples temple because jones how to

command a 3000 for folders going to go out and canvass neighborhoods and people's demonstrations and even cross voting districts to get people elected. he's basically saying yes, you helped get me elected and therefore i am going to make you head of the housing authority, which he did. and you are right that when these allegations of physical abuse and financial misdeeds have an, this plate that he held the lack, mayor ness county, district attorney joseph freed this, councilmember harvey milk turned a blind eye to it. you are right. of course milk in macedonia were killed about 10 days after the massacre happened. do you know, you had jane fonda, willie brown coming angela davis. you know, on the outside,

peoples temple look at. i talk about in the prologue that for me growing up as i did with a black brother and always feeling like a misfit and longing for a place to belong, if i had come to a temple service on a sunday morning and seeing this, i would've definitely been interested. my brother david and i -- i would've been interested because of his method of social justice. i would've been interested because there is real love between the members. i mean, having grown up in the church. a church is so much more than a liter. it's a relationship you have with the other congregate. and your kids becoming friends with them. now, for example, you can like stanley clayton from oakland whose mother didn't give a about an enlistment from grocery stores to get some need to eat while his younger brother was crying with hunger.

the sample offered him a place to sleep. the temple got him out of jail on early release. the temple encouraged him to get his ged. the temple ran all kinds of services. you know, drug rehab. it had childcare for working moms. it had medical care for the elderly impoverished people. i mean, it looked really good on the out side. so you know, i think it's kind of hard to blame these people. in retrospect, and now, you can say jim jones was an evil man. and so, marsh wrote killed us broke a story about what was happening in u.s. magazine with all of this came out. he really had communications on what was going on with the church.

angela would be to me. she's a very busy woman. >> i am wondering about -- i'm wondering about your research and how you were able to gain access to the sba fire rules. is that difficult? with the process was like for you. >> cat, so what happened was there was a foia, freedom of or nation lawsuit was filed by relatives of people who died in jonestown. and there is a professor of theology at san diego state university who had her two sisters killed in jonestown. they were the leadership. for her and her husband, this is a nonpathogenic filing lawsuit after lawsuit against the era to get these files released. and then, the fbi finally did release the files without an

index. so it's like, you know, a letter that would start on say -- they release them on cds. so whether it started not 81 page 208 come with an icd three, page 15, it was just not. and so they put all of this information together. and then myself -- we are the only people to have read through these documents in their entirety and a lot of them are very tedious documentation like, you know, purchase orders and really try status. but then every once in a while you come in to some and like this document, which is the camp doctor who is in charge of trying to figure out how to kill everyone, right? so, on wednesday the camp doctor stopped delivering babies in suturing would and went into his lab and tried to figure out how to kill everyone.

and this is one of the sub plots i was just like wow, this is stranger than fiction. so he tried to develop oshawa some end the staff at cockeyed toxins. and failed. he was growing these cultures and baby food jars he collected in the nursery. in this memo to john c. wright, cyanide is one of the most rapidly acting poison. i had misgivings about its effectiveness. for further research gamer confidence. i like to give two grants to see how such of our batches. so when these documents, you can see who is responsible for what. like very shot his two people have heard of is talking about tearing off everybody in

jonestown. you know, it was really interesting. there's another woman who is a probation officer in california's knuckling comes to jump town in shaping treats. she is now living in upstate new york, kind of disappeared into the woodwork as a lot of the time for leadership did after the massacre. she's actually about to get a rude surprise that the local reporters on her tail. but it was really fascinating, especially when you can see who's doing what and who is to blame for what. and so, it took me a year just to appease these documents together and figure out, you know, put them in chronological order and figure out how they structured the narrative. everyone knows how jonestown ends, but they don't know how my people in. and hopefully they will engage me to want you to read through an entire book and figure out what happens to them. >> my question as how it

happened before now with jim jones of the ultimate good intent and then you get so carried away and you're so kind of mired in your ideologies that you eventually become evil. and i was just wondering if that was, you know, if jim jones went to race in the learner psychological transition, where he genuinely was outraged by what was happening and he wanted to fix that. and then as he saw the peep hole were charmed by him, got to his head and power cartoonist ted. because it is so hard and fascinating to see him one, you know, who wants to do good in the world and then eventually

killed all his followers. that is still kind is so perplexing. anyway, i was just wondering what you found out. >> i think it's an interesting question whether jones really believed his hopeful just as in the quality works in the 50s when he was starting his ministry he kind of stumbled across this vulnerable group that wanted to hear this message. you know, in the 60s african-americans who weren't happy with the if you as a civil rights movement and here was this preacher who wanted to go further and who is really out there and not militant like black panthers were. but speaking publicly and vehemently about the fact about race and racism in america. and i think that is an interesting question. it's hard to say. he also was the first -- his was

the first family to adopt an african-american baby in indiana. so he integrated his own family. he later adopted kids from korea. and so, his family was a reflection of his ideology. and whether he really believed in soulful justice to that point or whether he kind of built his church upon the hope that these will, it's hard to tell. i do think that, you know, he was to the preacher, the minister, the head of the church has this authority figure that he wanted to be, like the first time he went to church. my key, coming from this loveless household wanted that type of the preacher getting this respect and attention and affection from the congregation.

and that is what he wanted for himself. i think eventually that power in the control got the better of him. even in indianapolis and somebody tried -- left his church, he was sending man fevered out income you know, it is god's will will you stay in my church. if you leave, something that happened to you. there is early evidence that he had this need to completely control his followers and leaders that just became more exacerbated. [inaudible] >> a friend of a friend of mine knew jim jones back in the men defend county days and was somewhat enamored of him and his movement and one not then not

some point she became disillusioned with it. and my friend asked her why. and her response was that she had become convinced that jones was ill. i just wondered if you had a common on not. >> right, he was emotionally disturbed if not mentally ill. i don't think he was ever diagnosed. waiver psychiatrist in the crowd. maybe they can -- after you read the book you can tell me. you know, it can comment the way he controls people, the extent to which she did it -- i mean, he -- he was growing this movement reported the, where it either you are for equality or

you're against it. i mean, everything was kind of black and white. and people would turn over their real estate holdings in all of their wealth to the church and move into a temple commune. and one woman, highest in russia's done that when she realized his son in his wrong with jim jones. but her sisters in the church and really believed then get angry every time hyacinth traced to talk to her. and if given all her worldly belongings to the church. she can't escape it. she doesn't know what to do. you know, so she figures she'll try jonestown. she doesn't like it, shall come back, but they nephew. all she got down there and jim jones and say nobody is leaving. it's hard to say.

there was an element, especially among the leadership of people who knew jones well and knew, will come to you as having liaisons with both men and women as a control for your. you know, you stayed in the church. i think i seek out further out the rank-and-file, the people, for example, he had a federally church in los angeles. a lot of people from that church with the jim jones on sunday with have anything to do with him the rest of the week. and they decided to go jonestown and try it out for a month or some thing, take a leave of absence and all of a sudden we're trapped on their having no idea what his plans were. questions. >> you mentioned a letter that

someone might send him and my mother just died a bike to go and jones is was definitely pose to anyone leaving the camp. you also mentioned that she thought even a year before this happened in 78 when his mother died in 77 he was actually can't be -- you mentioned the letter about the dog to her making a poisoned so he was already planning to kill him. and on the day it happened, a plane landed on alien strip. representative brian got out, et cetera, et cetera. several examiners can one was killed, one was survived. it has been in a narrative sort of way. in other words, the date developed in its own way. you know, one of the sort. you may or may not have intentions to kill. you get the point and to do it and so on and so forth and 30-pound them ideological

motivations. on the question of revolutionary suicide, it is not that they committed suicide, but also several murders in a truck that went landing strip and bash up a ceasefire and until representative brian and the journalist from the chronicle review examiner. i forget which one it was. he was a combination of suicide and murder. of course these people survive blakely related divide. markley survived. so is complicated and the question is what made that day generous? in other words, what made the narrative of that day unfold exactly in the way in which it did? it seems to me having read some about this anyway this guy has something to do with the navy veteran whose wife is apparently going to go back to civilization and apparently the husband did not want to to. so this particular episode in the days of them was completely

shielded from the public for months after it happened. in other words, i read all the newspapers in it page after page after page of documentation that the fbi gave the newspapers to publish at all kinds of things that jones going back to his birth. but the thing is the actual slight incident with representative brian was hidden in the speech that jones made him the same after this thing about brian, we have to commit suicide because they're going to come out and it's an impending invasion on the camp because i had tried to make the gesture of representative lines through with a switchblade. it seems to me there is a couple suicide plus homicide. and with that also planned? for the patches have typed in word then got out of jones' control. but then he had these guys who

went out to the airstrip. it seems like the wolf king was maybe not orchestrated, but was somehow involved in the settlement and a kind of revealed itself as the day went on in the events just kept on talking away and going on. what happens, i know now. people couldn't stop it or something? i never figured it out myself. >> so what's your question quaked >> he said he wanted to kill everyone and was intent on doing this a year ahead of time. i wonder if that might not have been true. in other words, whether the events of the day precipitated everything. in other words, if i had not tried to assassinate brian, perhaps jones would've continued with his charades for another decade or two. where do you think he was convinced he was going to wait them all out in a short span of time? his mother died one year before. thematic break, what happened was that leo ryan left john town

with not only the media, but also a group of defend yours. so these defectors were going to come back to the stage and basically blow the lid off jonestown. see, it was so to be controlled. if you go to my website you can listen to some of the audio, hide answers to reporters questions. for example, towards the end of jones town, all the residents were kind of in this crazy with sometimes some leafy vegetables and maybe some cassava leaves or some thing. enough protein. a lot of the people who survived last 30, 40 pounds. it is crazy how much weed. so they were very weak. and he had been rehearsing in jonestown. well, which we hear hear? v. well. that's not good enough. what do we hear?

we have worked. we have staked. you know, he was rehearsing them. he wanted that fantasy that jonestown was this great utopia to continue. and so, when those to fact or is left with leo ryan, he knew they were going to come back here and talk to the media and talk about how horrible conditions were. but the preacher is not rehearsing them as suicide drills and that he's planning to kill everyone and won't let anybody leave. so he knew the gateway drug. and you know, what precipitated that while he was able to say after a security guard shot upon ryan departing, while some of our people are implicated in this crime and we've always said it's one for all, all for one. and now the army is going to close and in torture as. and so, it would be better to

take this ocean of flip across to the other side. he believed in reincarnation. >> so just one more question. >> okay. >> did you speak to any of the department of justice or other investigators? >> i spoke with an fbi agent who is on the unit job town after the massacre. he was the late photographer who was down there. as far as the department of justice, i mean, most of their documentation, including all of their internal investigation was released in these files and that's what i worked off of.