In this series, Newsweek reconstructs the events leading to the Jonestown Massacre as it happened in 1978, day by day.On Sunday, as tension over Ryan's visit continued to swell, nurse Joyce Touchette told three local Amerindian children who she had taken under her wing and lived in the settlement to go back to their original home. The George children — David, 18; Gabriela, 10; and Phillip, 8 — walked back to the shack where their mother lived with eight other siblings.
Three hundred and four children would die the following Saturday, including 13 newborns and 24 seventeen-year-olds; the George children would be among them.In Guyana's capital, Georgetown, Jim Jones' aides continued to pressure the Temple's government allies for help. Although he was no longer the kingmaker he'd been in San Francisco, Jones had found something new to offer the men running the country: a bevy of attractive Temple women willing to do anything for the cause.
The fair-skinned"P.R. Girls" worked their charm on everyone from customs agents to cabinet members, sashaying past secretaries in miniskirts, bearing booze and greetings from"Bishop Jones" as they sought favors or distracted inspectors' attention from false-bottom shipping crates containing firearms. Jonestown's arsenal would grow to include more than thirty firearms, from .38 specials to a Ruger 30/.06 with a high powered scope.
Paula Adams speaking at a news conference after the Jonestown Massacre. Adams played a key role for Jim Jones by embarking on a relationship with Guyanese ambassador to the United States, Laurence Mann.Jones' star performer—his"political prostitute" as she called herself—was a petite brunette named Paula Adams. Adams, 28, seduced the Guyanese ambassador to the United States, Laurence Mann, a known playboy who was on his third marriage.
Now Adams and the other P.R. Girls pressed Guyanese authorities to block the visas of the eight newsmen accompanying Congressman Ryan. One journalist writing for New West magazine had all but destroyed the Temple's reputation in California. How much worse it would be, in Jones' mind, to have eight journalists set loose in his town, talking to residents at will and seeing things he that wanted kept hidden.
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