At the far end of the strip sat a yellow government plane. When the rains approached, he would stand and watch the water come, pushing solid and steady toward him like some enormous stage set being wheeled across the hills. Neither were the White Nights where everyone stayed up, armed with machetes to fight enemies who never arrived. This November 1978 file photo shows the bodies of Peoples Temple mass suicide victims led by Jim Jones in Jonestown, Guyana. Jim was the Rev. Those who broke rules were disciplined. The church provided free drug rehabilitation, medical care, food. He will read it when he is ready, he says. The phrase drinking the Kool-Aid, meaning to follow someone blindly, was born that day in Guyana. Jim Jones. Stephan is the only living son of Jim Jones and his late wife Marceline Jones. Everyone was waiting for him to take himself out. Neither were the White Nights where everyone stayed up, armed with machetes to fight enemies who never arrived. I could still hear the groaning and crying of the targets. After years of struggles that included drug addiction, Jones says hes now living a pleasant life in the United States with his wife and three daughters. I try not to speak in terms of what I couldve done because I see no value in that.. I had been up all night unloading boats and I had to be at work in a couple of hours so I lay down for two hours of sleep after backbreaking and dangerous work, and Dad comes on the speaker in the wee hours of the morning. "This is really crazy," he recalls thinking. "I wasn't there," he says. 2010-10-03 19:23:36. Stephan Jones was a nearly full-grown teen-ager when his father sent him to the Peoples Temple agricultural mission in the small South American coastal country of Guyana. Published: 01:29 EST, 14 November 2018 | Updated: 12:15 EST, 14 November 2018. Jones berated three other new arrivals for misbehavior on the trip; they were beaten and forced to work 24 hours straight. He was 18 and running a temple construction crew when the church sanctioned his marriage to a talented 16-year-old singer, Ollie Wideman. He did what was expected of him. What Are Essential Oils and Do They Work. 'There is no way we would be shooting at the airstrip. . Life became more tolerable after the couples baby, Martin Luther Smith, was born. Stephan Gandhi Jones is the son of the notorious religious cult leader Jim Jones. Listen, not long before, we went to play basketball. NBC reporter Don Harris said coolly: 'I think we're in for some trouble.'. Besides the tragic story behind his ancestors, Stephan Jones has set his great work as an actor in the Hollywood Industry. Vilchez was dispatched to the Guyanese capital of Georgetown to raise money. We used curtains for bandages. The murders and suicides were unfolding, 150 miles away. 'Hit the deck!' I noticed them in real time. When I left at 21, I left a part of myself there, she said. Another hit my wrist and knocked off my watch. "I would have had to, especially if I saw other people doing it, and I right off the bat wasn't on top of things, and somehow wasn't right there starting some kind of--it's so hard--", Stephan Jones covers his face for a moment, fingers kneading his forehead. Is this surge in public interest in Jonestown an exhausting experience for you? The rest was jungle, damp and hot and so thick with growth that Stephan Jones would stand among the massive trees and feel the 20th century fall away. "I mellowed out. This return to the cult of Jim Jones is part of a re-examination of dangerous cults and movements in Americas past, like the Osho cult, which had a similar murderous potential. Where the machine shop once stood, there was only rusty equipment. target_type: 'mix' His father spoke so ardently about his own self-sacrifice; Stephan Jones saw the specially prepared steaks and the color television, and in the temple apartment where they lived, he grew accustomed to glimpses of his father having sex with temple members--sometimes women, sometimes men. 'Little Jimmy' became part of their 'Rainbow Family' of white, black, Korean-American and Native American children. He's 61 now. We built a community out of nothing in four years, recalled Touchette, now a 65-year-old grandfather who has worked for a Miami hydraulics company for nearly 30 years. White devil.' And frankly, Im much more trusting of the reluctant leader, one who says Lets go and not Go.. "I don't even know who my loved ones were with when they died," he says softly. He does not know. Reporters were hearing disturbing allegations about Jim Jones' church--there were stories of beatings, armed guards, extensive sexual activity. Among the hundreds of corpses, only one was different; he had died from a bullet to the head. ", Stephan Jones used to say he could have stopped the slaughter if he had been there. Stephanie was one of six victims in the car accident coming back from Cincinatti.Birth name: . People raced over to the outdoor pavilion. He loves basketball; he is agile and strong and was tall even before he reached high school. "I don't care what you think of my father," Jones wrote in 2015. I see it in politics, I see it in advertising, I see it in a variety of places, and I feel theres no more pernicious or toxic belief than that. . Hundreds of corpses were lying on the ground in front of them. Stephan Jones, Jim Jones's sole surviving child, was born in Indiana, United States, on June 1, 1959. But the boy was still a child of the Temple. Its not entirely surprising that many Americans and others want to understand how thousands of people can become blind followers of a tempestuous leader, and how it can end. Jordan Vilchez's parents were Berkeley progressives in the 1960s - her father African-American, her mother Scotch-Irish. "I think he would be admitting in his own warped mind that he was not this great revolutionary he had tried to build himself up to be . 'Let's go!' Like why would they follow such a madman and to such a crazy final act, and we probably know by now that it wasnt a mass suicide, but thats how it has been portrayed.. He was a genius, and he was unique. Like everyone else, he died there, his son said. I got the gun. He asked me to make one last mission with him to Jonestown. In the days before Ryans fact-finding mission to the settlement, the players were in Georgetown for a tourney with the Guyana national teams. Hes 61 now. Jon was born on January 31, 1975, in Oakland, California. After that I didnt sleep well last night., I wouldnt say therapeutic. Jim Jones set off one of these panics every few weeks, sometimes keeping people awake all night as he shouted his warnings. Jim Jones of the Peoples Temple, poses for a portrait near San Rafael, Calif. So much was attractive and unique that we turned a blind eye on what was wrong, he said, including his fathers sexual excesses, drug abuse and rants. When Jim Sr., a local Democratic Party darling, met with future first lady Rosalynn Carter, Jim Jr. proudly went along. In addition to writing the articles below, Stephan appeared as a speaker during the Griot Institute of African Studies lecture series entitled Jonestown: 35 Years Later at Bucknell University; his presentation appears on this page (scroll down the videos). There are moments when he glimpses the edges of power and understands precisely how it might be used. Stephan Gandhi Jones was the biological son of Jim and Marceline Jones. That way no one else would want to live. Other people were injured. 'Destroyed,' he said, 'from within '. He was ill from when he was very young and was using fear to control me when I was barely more than a toddler. He thinks now that it is probably stupid to believe that. The reunion with Jones was not as joyous. Partner of Terry Carter Jones, aka Mary Theresa Carter, Mary Theresa Jones, Terry Carter Jones (died November 18 . He is talking, in the first of two evenings' long conversations, between spoonfuls of almond chicken at a Chinese restaurant. Now, Stephan Jones is father of three daughters, ages 16, 25 and 29, and works in the office furniture installation business. Heres How To Watch The Alex Murdaugh Trial Live, Morgan Doughty Filed A Lawsuit Against The Murdaugh Family, Sophie Turners Joan Charts The Rise Of A Famous British Jewel Thief, Alex Murdaugh Faces Life In Prison For Allegedly Killing His Wife & Son, Get Even More From Bustle Sign Up For The Newsletter. ". It would become a little town where people of all ages and colors raised food and children. He is able to weep, but worries about letting himself begin; he says it feels a little like pulling his finger from a crack in the dam. Do not sell or share my personal information. Then, with heart-stopping suddenness, the first shot was fired. Contact & Personal Details. According to his 1983 interview with The Washington Post, he was in this line of work even back then. Layton, who was insisting on taking the first plane, slipped to the other side of the plane before he could be frisked. And it was necessary in my own healing for me to find acceptance for him, understanding of him. There was a gaping wound in his shoulder and possibly his ribs. (1991 - And Smiths wife, son and mother died. Greg's body was near the boarding steps with his camera bag and cameras scattered around him. According to former members, Jones would not tolerate defections from the mission project and many of the church members considered those who leave to be traitors. Stephan is the only living son of Jim Jones and his late wife. Sorry we are not currently accepting comments on this article. Stephan Jones was born on June 1, 1959 in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA. Or lost touch with reality? Jim Jones. We were trying to build a new world, a progressive socialist organization.. "I say, 'Mom,' " Stephan Jones says, recalling a desperate mother-son huddle toward the end, " 'We're talking about a man who think's he's God. Patricia Parks had had her head shattered before her husband's eyes. placement: 'Below Article Thumbnails 2nd', Stephan ran to the U.S. Embassy and appealed for a helicopter to take him to the colony to try to stop the disaster, but no one listened. For 19 of his 24 years, they were all he knew. The temple was the only life he knew but says he always had his doubts. 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