Jim Jones Research Paper

On November 18, 1978, in “Jones town” more than 900 members of an American cult Peoples Temple died in a mass suicide-murder under the direction of their leader Jim Jones. The megalomaniac leader, Jim Jones, was born on May 31, 1931, in rural Indiana. Everything started at the 1950’s, when he began working as a self-ordained Christian minister in small churches around Indianapolis. He wanted to do a church of his own, and to collect money for it he tried various ways, including selling live monkeys door-to-door.

Overall, Jim Jones was a notorious cult leader who was successful in convincing over 900 men, women, and children to commit suicide. Even though most of the members were killed due to the consumption of poison, Jones died from a gunshot wound to the head. Only a few survived this unfortunate event at Jonestown. Jones was an intelligent man who was disturbed by his past and used multiple tricks he learned as he was growing up such as becoming a strong speaker, being manipulative, and understanding what other people in society wanted. This was Jones’ way of revenge for the people who thought he wasn’t good enough to accomplish anything, although, his accomplishment was pure evil.

Jim Jones was religious cult leader who started the Peoples Temple and lead a group to Guyana, South America. He convinced people that he was God, but that changed when he started making them participate in dangerous practices. To see if the people of Jonestown were loyal to him, he would hold suicide practices, called "White Nights"where followers would drink a liquid that they believed was poisonous. Jim Jones gave members relentless punishments if they went against him and were forced to work strenuously out in the fields. Late at night, they were compelled to go to long, tedious meetings and guards kept them in the camp just like slave catchers.

One remarkable character of the cult is that each social or religious group has a possibility to be the cult. They gradually change into the "destructive cult" through the social situation. As Jim Jone tried to help the inequality of African American in American society at the first time (Pick-jones, 2007). However, because of Jone 's frustration with his family and difficulty of control growing his followers, he addicted by drug and he became abuse, punish and finally led his followers to the mass suicide in Jonestown (Pick-jones, 2007). In addition, Japanese famous "destructive cult", Aum Shinrikyo, was started from the yoga class (Akimoto, 2006).

Horrific, traumatic, disturbing. There are so many words I could attempt to use, but none of them accurately capture the absolutely devastating event that took place on November 18th, 1978. The life and energy of the Peoples Temple to their tragic deaths in the miserable heat of Guyana. The story of a group of people fighting for their beliefs, and why their own leader, Jim Jones, lead them to their dreadful end. On May 13th, 1931 , Jim Jones was born in a small town in Indiana.

Before the sights of the 9/11 attacks, the Jonestown massacre was the largest loss of U.S. civilian lives through a non-natural disaster. The mastermind and leader of this, Jim Jones, was a man born in rural Indiana on May 31, 1931. In Jones early 20s, he began to work as a Christian minister in Indianapolis. He was a self-oriented minister that just worked in small churches or smaller churches. Instead of moving from church to church, Jones wanted to settle down and run his own church.

How I would justify Capitan Lashbrooke’s decision of stopping the attack halfway and almost leaving the Sergeant Major, Snell, Tom and the 3 other soldiers behind is by showing betrayal, disloyalty, and selfishness. Capitan Lashbrooke felt it was “ok” to leave the bugler, the Corporal, and the Sergeant Major along with some soldiers behind. He didn’t know value and importance of these people, and was willing would have left them behind. He didn’t realize how the battle would have gone without having the Sergeant Major. Throughout the book, Captain Lashbrooke always had orders for Jim, but if he wasn’t present, some things wouldn’t be the same.

Hemingway once said that, “All modern American literature comes from one book by Mark Twain, Huck Finn.” Samuel Langhorne Clemens, better known by his pen name Mark Twain, is said to be one of the most controversial yet influential writers of American history. Twain grew up in Hannibal Missouri where he idealized the book Tom Sawyer. Mark Twain got his fame from his writing, “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” The novel Huck Finn is focuses on a fourteen year old named Huck Finn from Missouri who is suppose to start learning how to be a gentleman. Huck’s deadbeat dad kidnaps him, but fakes his own death and hides on an island.

Robert Wood Johnson II’s father, Robert Wood Johnson, has a foundation named after him. The foundation is called the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). The foundation supports a wide variety of research and programs targeting some of America’s most serious health issues. According to http://www.rwjf.org/en/about-rwjf.html RWJF is the nation’s largest philanthropy dedicated to health. They are working to build a national Culture of Health.

Alfred F. Jones was born and raised in a small town in Wisconsin to upper middle-class parents. He had the best brother in the world named Matthew who is also his closest friend and partner in crime. They spent most of their time together during their childhood. Even though being the older sibling, Alfred was far more immature than his younger kin. While Matthew would rather stay at home reading a good book or two, Alfred would go out with his rambunctious friends and attend house parties or wild raves.