Jonestown: Vacation Destination? If Thirsty, "Don't Drink the Kool-Aid"

909 people, including 267 children, died by suicide or were murdered by cyanide injection on November 18, 1978, at "The Peoples Temple Agricultural Project", better known by the unofficial name "Jonestown" after the leader of the group, Jim Jones. Joseph Scott Morgan and Dave Mack discuss the group, how they ended up in the jungle of Guyana, and how most of the men, women, and children, died. Professor Morgan explains how Dr. William Eckert described the "smell of death" a mile away and 2000 feet in the air in a helicopter as he was arriving at the facility, what took place in identifying the dead, the condition of the bodies that were exposed to the elements, and what it would have been like for the victims who "drank the kool-aid".  Oddly enough, the phrase "drink the kool-aid", referring to people blindly following leadership regardless of the truth, isn't correct. The people of Jonestown did not drink "Kool-Aid". They drank a cheap, knock-off  version of Kool-Aid called Flavor Aid.  

 

 

 

 

Transcribe Highlights
00:01.72 Introduction - environment

01:42.95 Jonestown "Don't Drink the Kool-Aid"

05:16.89 Remembering the reporting of Jonestown Suicide

09:41.90  Describing bloated bodies 

10:34.71 What is left of Jonestown

12:18.99  Jim Jones cultivated political relationships

16:25.53  Jonestown was very isolated 

20:06.23 Flies would be all over the scene

25:28.77 Have to determine how people were killed

29:54.63 Rep Leo Ryan killed at airstrip 6 miles from Jonestown

34:47.87 Jim Jones was not a "man of the cloth"

39:20.62 Value of Dark Tourism

40:25.99 Conclusion

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