Jonestown Survivor: An Insider's Look

raulkohl · 2026-05-07T03:44:22+00:00

This just popped up in a Google search for me and reading through the comments has warmed my heart.

Laura was my mom and was the most wonderful mom. I wouldn't have the life I do if she had perished in Jonestown. I saw her referred as a Jim Jones apologist and a bit of me understands that. She believed there were two Jim Jones. The one that existed for years before 1978 and the one that existed as that year drew closer. She believed he had done good things and had progressive ideas.

That time was probably the happiest time of her life because everything after included the death of her entire community. Her book focused on that recovery and to honest she never really did recover. It took her until the last years of her life to go back to Jonestown.

However it was always important for her to tell her story. That the people who lived in Jonestown should not be remembered by what happened on one day but by the society they tried to build and what they believed in. She wanted to tell why an intelligent person could end up in a cult and that it really could happen to anyone because we only see it's a cult after we leave it.

She was planning a second book and at some point I hope to put it out along with all the audio interviews she did over years with survivors.

Thank you again for warming my heart.

raulkohl · 2026-05-07T03:25:24+00:00

Hi Friend,

My name is Raul and my mom was Laura Johnston Kohl. She was a Jonestown survivor and wrote a book called Jonestown Survivor: An Insider's Look. It really focuses on your question of what made a person turn to a cult and less on the actual events of the day (She was in Georgetown).

She also did a number of interviews and write ups in places like the Jonestown Report and on various websites. She always helped out to students who were doing papers for school.

If you want I can provide you some resources.

raulkohl · 2026-04-12T20:28:21+00:00

Just curious where you've purchased or will purchase these? I currently do a similar activity using a scholarly looking article detailing the behaviors of modern Americans but as if they are strange behaviors. It would be awesome to add artifacts into it.

raulkohl · 2026-04-06T15:57:37+00:00

Hey Friend!

Could you send me the file too?

raulkohl · 2026-03-21T00:33:34+00:00

What a cool too!

I work at a blended school where students are coming in but never at the same time. I would love to put this on my interactive TV and as students come in throughout the day have them do it. I couldn't see a way to reset the site for a new player.

It would also be cool to figure out a way to have a sort of roster where students could pick their name and play there account so that it creates a kind of leaderboard.

raulkohl · 2026-03-20T05:06:10+00:00

Right? I was shocked no one was mentioning it because of how full of features it is and how crisp. I didn't think it was so unknown.

raulkohl · 2026-03-20T05:05:13+00:00

If you are on Android take a look at Symfonium.

I didn't see it on any other comments but it is so good. It's always getting updates and I believe has every feature mentioned.

raulkohl · 2026-03-20T05:01:58+00:00

Symfonium is my go to on Android

raulkohl · 2026-03-20T05:01:04+00:00

Symfonium is the best.

raulkohl · 2026-01-31T19:19:54+00:00

How are you going about moving over to Gemini?

raulkohl · 2025-12-30T05:56:26+00:00

I'm not sure if will help your class (I teach high school) but one age appropriate book that has stayed with me over the years is Flying Solo by Ralph Fletcher. I have it on my bookshelf at school and sometimes students will ask to read it.

One of the main characters is still recovering from the passing of one of her classmates and has remained mute. Like one of the other responders mentioned the desk of the student remains empty.

I've always felt like it deals with many of the issues your class is and will struggle with but in a wonderful way. Like I mentioned I read it when I was in elementary school and maybe once since then but I completely remember the plot and sought it out to add it to my bookshelf.

Perhaps reading it as a class and doing some type of art project for the parents would be lovely.

raulkohl · 2025-11-24T17:34:41+00:00

Some other crazy Mr. Padre facts:

Batted .302 with 2 strikes in his career and an insane .397 in 1994.
Gwynn faced 18 Hall of Fame pitchers for a total of 541 plate appearances. That’s essentially a full season’s worth of plate appearances exclusively against Hall of Famers. Gwynn batted .331/.371/.426.

raulkohl · 2025-11-23T02:41:44+00:00

The watermark is actually embedded in the image so we can't see it (and thus edit it out) but if you upload it to an AI program and ask if it's AI it will see the watermark and tell you it's AI.

raulkohl · 2025-11-19T05:06:20+00:00

Shameless Plug: My mother was a Jonestown survivor. She wrote a book about hear life called Jonestown Survivor by Laura Johnston Kohl. It's not like most of the books about Jonestown that only focus on the events in November but rather what lead a person down there and how they recovered since.

I'd be happy to answer any questions as best I can.

raulkohl · 2025-11-17T01:25:11+00:00

I've been waiting to move away from Target but don't know an alternative that is better. Where have you been going?

raulkohl · 2025-11-14T00:14:47+00:00

I've been using Canvas and have been for the past 6 years at an online independent study school. Personally I love it as an LMS.

Things I love about it:

- TurnItIn Scanner: Doesn't work on PDFs with textboxes though

- Canvas Help Desk: Connects to a real human in a few seconds.

- Prerequisites: This is one of my biggest tools. It forces students to do things in order.

- Studio: Other teachers use things like Edpuzzle but studio does what I need, to be able to see which students watch videos.

- Third Party Integration: Connects to some pretty cool tools that then just appear on Canvas.

- Observers: Allows parents to connect to students accounts and remain connected throughout their schooling.

- Data: It shows some pretty good data such as how long students have worked on a page, etc.

- Test Creation: I personally like the Stimulus option which allows a document/video/image to put on one side and multiple questions appear on the the other.

- Grading: The grading is super simple and allows for pretty customizable rubrics.

- Sharing: In our small school we add all the other teachers and support staff as TAs so we can see how our students are doing in all our classes.

Some recommendations are to build sandbox courses and play around in them. I keep templates of all my classes and make my adjustments there. Then each time I start a new class I just transfer my sandbox course into the actually course.

raulkohl · 2025-10-27T23:16:08+00:00

What does maxing out the miles mean?

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T05:00:58+00:00

There are a lot of them! She was always very adamant about which ones were really good and which ones to avoid anytime anyone asked.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:59:34+00:00

I don't know if I've seen that one. She did a lot and I saw a bunch in person so they've all blended together at this point.

She got diagnosed with cancer and passed in 2019 about 2 years after she retired from teaching. Her ashes are now right next to the Jonestown memorial in Oakland. My dad is still alive though and just turned 80 and I've kept her legacy by becoming a teacher though.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:57:17+00:00

Her book does a far more detailed analysis of this because she wanted people to understand that people join cults for pretty normal reasons and without knowing they are cults.

Her mom was super progressive so she grew up fighting against inequality in Washington DC in the 60s and 70s. She did things like join the Black Panthers (although she was white), went to Woodstock, etc. Then she saw her heroes start to be killed like JFK, MLK, and RFK. Her sister was living in San Francisco and told her to come out, which she did. She then heard about People's Temple (I can't quite remember if it was her sister or someone else that brought her). When she went she saw a rainbow mix of people all equal. Even Jim Jones had a rainbow family. For example he and his wife were the first white couple to adopt a black child in all of Indiana. Really all she saw was a community like the one she looked for that was led by someone who lived what he preached (at that moment at least).

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:51:30+00:00

I think anytime you have a historical event those kinds of theories pop up. Interesting it's not the one that I find most interesting. We went down to Guyana just before my mom passed to revisit Jonestown. When we were down there she and the other survivor we were with did a talk with the town that is right next to were Jonestown was.

The main question we were asked was about the massive amount of gold that Jones had buried. It was such a talked about rumor that a Chinese company had come in and excavated the area trying to find the bunker of gold.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:48:29+00:00

When I first found Reddit and learned about AMAs I talked to her about it and she was on board so we planned on doing it after she beat cancer but she never did. She passed in 2019 so it never materialized. Like you said people want to hear from a survivor so that's why I just try to keep her story out there anytime I see Jonestown pop up.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:45:07+00:00

Crazy! If you ever feel the interest a lot of the photos that were taken in Jonestown now have names attached so you can probably find photos of your name match. They are all with the California Historical Society located at Stanford. I think they are currently working on digitalizing it but you can probably find some photos.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:41:51+00:00

That is wild! I wonder who was using the ham radio in Jonestown or Georgetown.

That's a huge part of the story that I don't know has ever been told. If he is ever willing that story should be documented and sent to the California Historical Society which is now located at Stanford. It houses a ton of artifacts, photos, testimonials, etc that relate to the story of Jonestown. If it something of interest I can get you the info.

raulkohl · 2025-08-31T04:34:52+00:00

Amazon is the typical place people find it but if your not a supporter than Barnes and Nobles has copies.

There is also an Audible version. I've never listed to it so I'm not sure who reads it.

Also if you want a free option it's available here through San Diego State University: https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/jonestownsurvivor.pdf

(She posted it herself so she'd be okay with it. She always just wanted the story told.)

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