In January 1977, not two years before Reverend Jim Jones would orchestrate his followers’ deaths by the hundreds, a San Francisco church bestowed its Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award on him. Jones, the founder of the Peoples Temple of the Disciples of Christ, had managed to become a major player in the city’s politics. No one foresaw the horrific depths to which the combination of a charismatic leader, an all-encompassing belief system, and the human need for community and redemption would soon descend.
