The Road to Jonestown: Jim Jones and Peoples Temple

by Jeff Guinn

White leaders continued agreeing to meet whenever black ministers asked, and afterward nothing changed—except when Jim Jones was involved. If he wasn’t moving racist mountains, he at least flattened some bumps. White officials came to Peoples Temple and followed through on promises made there, about minor issues like pothole repair or more up-to-date school textbooks, perhaps, but such things were significant compared to the complete failure of black ministers to get anything at all for their congregants. Black folks around the city took notice; the January 4, 1957, edition of the Indianapolis Reporter, a prominent black newspaper, included Jones on its “human relations honor roll.”