Congresswoman Jackie Speier - some history that is not so far back in our past

[Siwsan]

I SURVIVED the Jonestown Massacre: Congresswoman tells all 40 years after she was shot FIVE times point blank as she tried to rescue cult members before the notorious mass Flavor-Aid poisoning and murders that claimed 913 lives

Jackie Speier felt in her gut that something was wrong.

She was 28 years old, a California native with a law degree and a prestigious job with Congressman Leo Ryan – a man who’d mentored her since she volunteered for his campaign while still in high school - and she was preparing to accompany him as just one of two staffers on a trip to South America. They were traveling to check out firsthand the compound of Jim Jones and the hundreds who’d followed him to Guyana, many of them Ryan’s constituents, and Speier was disconcerted by accounts she’d heard from so many of those followers’ relatives – and people who’d defected themselves from Jones’ Peoples Temple.

Speier, during early November in 1978, couldn’t put her finger on exactly why, but she was nervous about Ryan’s plan to visit the secluded compound and the cult leader who’d been portrayed by so many as volatile. She shared her anxiety with friends and family, but she blamed it on the fact she’d be flying in a tiny aircraft over Guyanese jungle.

Little did she know that, just days later, she’d be fighting for her life in that very same jungle, cowered in the cargo hold of the same tiny plane, wondering if and when help would ever arrive. Her fears had been realized to an unimaginable extent. Ryan and hundreds more were dead, and she was fading in and out of consciousness, her body riddled with five bullets, as gunmen wandered around finishing off victims at point-blank range.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6395051/Shot-playing-dead-left-die-jungle-Congresswoman-recounts-attack-near-Jonestown.html

[kentuck]

1. Interesting story.

Thanks!

[Siwsan]

2. I was stationed in Iceland when this happened

Talk about being worlds away, but I can remember reading about it, as if it was yesterday.

[Snackshack]

3. Yep.

She is one incredibly brave lady. I remember watching the news footage from a helicopter flying over “Jonestown” and seeing hundreds of bodies laying next to each other.

There is are several good documentaries about this horrible event that can be viewed if one interested.

[gopiscrap]

4. My wife and I got engaged the night it happened

[malaise]

5. I'll never forget Jonestown

I'm glad she's telling all because too many don't know that horrific event.

[kentuck]

6. There's a show on Sunday night about Jonestown Massacre..

I can't recall the network.....maybe CNN?

[Hermit-The-Prog]

7. cultists should learn the history of cults

The RWNJs are scary because of things like Jonestown.

[Small-Axe]

8. I was living in Berkeley as a university student when the massacre happened.

Most of the people in Jonestown were from the Bay Area, so in addition to it being big national news it had a profound emotional impact locally.

Then just nine days later, a deranged right-wing SF Supervisor named Dan White murdered SF Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk.

The Bay Area went into a state of grief and shock of the sort similar that the Kennedy assassination or 911.

Out of this crisis, Dianne Feinstein emerged as the leader people looked to for hope. She's had my admiration ever since.

[Ilsa]

9. Documentary will be on the Sundance Channel Saturday and Sunday nights.

I'm recording it.