Seductive Poison
Page 38
I am deeply grateful to Terrance Lim for not running away when he found out who I was, for believing in this book, supporting my decision to quit my job before I had even drafted a proposal, and for remaining my beacon of light as I descended into the shadows of my past. His belief spurred me on when the task felt overwhelming.
I would like to express deep gratitude to my literary agent, Amy Rennert, who believed in this book from pur first conversation, helped shape the proposal and followed up with many long and encouraging phone conversations. I am beholden to my tireless editor at Anchor, Tina Pohlman, for her enthusiasm which gave my heart a lift, for her beautifully written missives filled with honest and insightful comments, and for our long Sunday conversations. I am also grateful to Martha Levin, former publisher at Anchor, without whose faith this story would never have made it into print. I am indebted to Phillip Ziegler for his counsel, his help in leading me into the past, and his giving me the strength to face the shame. He gave me my voice back and told me I had a story to tell.
I could not have written this book without the support of my family. I thank my father, Laurence Laird Layton, Ph.D., whose message, “think for yourself,” I kept hidden in my secret compartment until I could finally hear it, for whom this tragedy will never end, who wept through each chapter and courageously read on; my brother Thomas N. Layton, Ph.D., professor, passionate family historian, and author himself (The Voyage of the Frolic: New England Merchants and the Opium Trade), for his enthusiasm for my project, his archive of family documents, encouraging phone calls, writer’s block commiserating, and for having had the foresight to record my story immediately after my escape; my sister, Annalisa Layton Valentine, who has always been there for me, for her love and calm support when fielding my frightened calls from Guyana, for her invaluable help in editing critical portions of the manuscript, and her wonderful late night meals in front of her fire; my brother Laurence John “Larry” Layton, who called me every day from prison, who has given me the courage and unconditional love to write the story that devoured our youth, stole our mother, and continues to keep him behind bars. Larry remains an integral part of my life and over these many years has kept in touch with my daughter through the wonderful children’s stories he writes for her. And especially, my daughter, Lauren Elizabeth, for remaining strong and brave as she learned the truth of my past, for her innate compassion, her love of history and the truth, and for her long list of suggestions for titles; my brother-in-law, Dr. Raymond Valentine, for his thoughtful suggestions and comments throughout; David Layton Valentine, my nephew, for his earnest reading of the manuscript and for not hanging up the phone when I was covertly calling his mother from Guyana when he was only four years old; Lori-Lisa Valentine, my niece, for her earthy spirit and support; Aunt Eva Philip Rosencranz, Mama’s sister, who took me into her arms as one of her very own and mothered me when my daughter was born; Nance Rosencranz, my cousin, who took me in as well; and my mother’s cousin Lisl Hirsch Burnham, who also has an escape story to tell.
I thank my dear friend Bridget V. Moar, whom I met during my metamorphosis at Montgomery Securities, who long ago began to instruct me on decorum, held my hand through each of my brother’s trials, and, when I began to write, listened, advised me, and cried; Susan Feiga for her extraordinary friendship, her devoted support during Larry’s trials, and for all the candles she has burned on my behalf; Brigitte Heftman and Dr. Erik Heftman, friends of my parents and gratefully now mine, too, who have read, listened to, enjoyed, and celebrated each new draft, and Sandye Lim, for her serene nonjudgmental ear, warmth, suggestions, and friendship.
I want to acknowledge the friends who encouraged this project, read drafts, and gave me their honest feedback: Will Weinstein, my boss on the trading floor of Genesis Merchant Group Securities, who has always believed in me, counseled, and taught me, and who has supported me in innumerable ways, and backed my decision to quit working for him and write my story; Chris Honoré, a writer,wonderful one-man support team, for invaluable suggestions throughout, for his encouraging calls and images of what leaving meant to him; Jim Randolph for sharing his feelings, wisdom, friendship, and his memories of my mother; Dr. Morris Weiss and Audrey Weiss for their insightful observations and for our rigorous discussions during dinners in Berkeley and Carmel; Theodore and Lillian Stewart for their friendship; Jan Hale for her writer’s enthusiasm; Barbara Cohen and Georgia Cassel, who told me years ago that my past was something to be proud of; Dawn Margolin, for her aerobic counsel; M. J. Tocci and Dr. Jonathan Rest for their longdistance friendship; Susan Alpert and Dr. Bernard Alpert for their incredible generosity and support; Jan Montgomery for her therapeutic phone calls and reassurance when I felt I was losing my way; Marya Grambs for her counsel, verve, and fascinating lunch discussions; Annie Stine for her last-minute assistance and wonderfully soothing voice; Virginia Raffi, for her many years of encouragement; Mark Witriol for his honest commentary; Jeannie Cahill for taking the time to ponder my questions; Beverly Shelton for her multiple readings; Yvonne Monteiro-Brown and Fran Sutherland for their friendship; and Mr. Fred Lincoln for telling me years ago that I could do anything I set my heart to.
I would like to give thanks to my first friends outside the Temple at the brokerage firm of Dean Witter Reynolds: David Cho for his unwavering belief, Sheryl Ishigaki for her love of life, and Mike Zima for his incredible humor; all three of you taught me well and I thank you all. Also to the many friends on the trading floor of Montgomery Securities. In particular, Thorn Weisel for influencing me in ways he could not know and accepting me unconditionally; the late Ned Blackwood, whose life was taken too young, for taking me under his protective wing, and for my crash course on “This Other World: 101”; Ben Simon for his enduring kindness and delicious sandwich; Elaine and Ralph Blair for their chic camaraderie; James Stack for listening; and the late gifted and lovely Betsy Woods.
I am profoundly grateful to Loren Buddress, who granted me his honorable, moral, and heart-felt support in more ways than I can count or ever thank him for.
I wish Susie Smoke, my friend, photographer, and staunch supporter, were alive today to see me finally step out from the shadow of Jonestown. I miss her laugh, our spirited conversations, and her concern for my brother Larry.
I consider myself lucky to have had the opportunity to meet Charles Krause, the Emmy Award—winning journalist, whose life was almost lost when he went to Jonestown on assignment for the Washington Post. Our paths crossed eighteen years later and I am grateful.
I am ever grateful to my friends John Clark and Grace Stoen, who became my mentors and friends after my escape, for opening my eyes. Both desperately tried to get their own families out from the clutches of Jim Jones, but lost their battles. John lost his mother, sister, stepfather, and stepbrother, and Grace her six year-old son, John-John.
I dearly thank Dr. Steven Katsaris, who didn’t hang up when he heard my voice, for bravely reading my manuscript, and for his commentary. He too has suffered deeply with the loss of his daughter, Maria, and the injury of his son, Anthony, at the airstrip in Guyana. I thank Stephan Jones for his bravery, friendship, support, and willingness to share his thoughts, time, daughter, and family photographs with me; Dr. John and Barbara Moore, who lost their daughters Annie and Carolyn as well as their grandson Kimo; Dr. Rebecca Moore, Annie and Carolyn’s sister, and her husband Fielding Mcgehee for their incredible strength, love, and passionate belief that Larry should be allowed to come home.
I remain deeply appreciative to Sheri Glucoft Wong for her guidance, and Dr. Philip Zimbardo and his Stanford psychology class on Mind Control. As I spoke to his class of 200 students, feeling embarrassed and ashamed of my part in this historical event, I was put at ease by their nonjudgmental and insightful questions.
Last, I wish I could thank in person the late Honorable Chief Judge Robert F. Peckham. I did not know him personally, but came to know him well while he sat in his black robes on the bench before me, judging my brother. He
was firm and unrelenting in ferreting out truth from fiction, hype from fact, and ultimately fairness from political maneuverings. He believed Larry was a minor player in an enormous tragedy and never stopped trying to get Larry freed. The Honorable Robert Peckham died in 1993.
Photographs
Preaching in Ukiah. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
With Temple children. On the left a teenager is holding Grace and Tim Stoen’s son, John-John. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Larry with his new wife Karen, Ukiah, California, 1969. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The Reverend Jim Jones, our “Prophet,” Ukiah, California, early 1970s.(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
School graduation photo, Ackworth School, Yorkshire England, 1971. Mark Blakey is right behind me.(DEBORAH LAYTON)
Larry cutting the wedding cake with Carolyn, David, California, 1967.(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Leaving for boarding school at age sixteen, 1969. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Back home in Berkeley in 1970, after punching my fist through a window at school, and just two weeks before my first meeting with Jim Jones. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Our home in Berkeley, 1959; in the background is the etching of Pablo Casals and the sculpture Die Erwachende (“The Awakening”), by Klimsch.(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The missing sculpture. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
After arriving by train in Berkeley, California, 1957. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The Layton family by our pool in Berkeley, California, 1959. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
All four Layton children. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The family vacationing at Virginia Beach, 1955. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My grandma Anita in 1950, two years before her suicide.(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Exactly nine months after Anita’s death, I come home from the hospital, Utah, February 1953.
(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Their first child, Tom, at age 2, 1944. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Mama with my sister, Annalisa, 1945. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The Layton family on their way to a 1947 Friends meeting, my parents holding their third child, Larry, with Tom and Annalisa at curb. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Papa, proud Ph.D. graduate in biochemistry, Penn State, 1942. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Lisa as a newly wed in Rochester, New York, 1942. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Lisa and Laurence, circa 1944. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My father’s parents: John and Eva Layton, Boomer, West Virginia, 1913 (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My father’s hometown of Boomer, 1930. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My father, Laurence L. Layton, 1940. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Hugo (with pipe) and
Anita (with scarf) on their
passage to freedom, via Genoa, Italy, to New York, on the
Conte di Savioia, March 1940. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
The first photo of my mother in New York, 1939. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My grandparents in freedom, New York.
Mama’s passport issued by the German Reich, 1938.(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Lisa and her father in Hamburg, 1935. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
On the deck of “Haus Philip” overlooking the Alster River, 1931. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Anita and Lisa (left), Hugo (second from right), with guests on their terrace, 1929. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
“Haus Philip,” in Hamburg, designed by Block and Hochfeld. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
My mother, Lisa Philip, with her sister Eva (left) in their garden, 1923. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
“Mutti,” my grandmother, Anita Philip, in Hamburg, 1914. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
“Papsche,” my grandfather, Hugo Philip, playing his Guadagnini violin. (COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Working the crowd.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Ever-present support from Marcie.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Making contact with a new member.
Larry is singing in the background.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Receiving praise. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Jim working a spell on his congregation.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
First phone transmissions into
Jonestown, the Temple’s newly acquired
outpost in Guyana, South America,
1974. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Larry in front of a Temple bus in
1972. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Karen (left), already recruiting Mama
(right) and me, Berkeley, 1974.
(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Receiving my surgeon’s assistant
diploma, San Francisco, 1975.
(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
A convoy of Temple buses out to conquer
the United States.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Father turning water into wine.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Preaching about the government’s plans to
build concentration camps for people of color
in America. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Jim in his role as a healer.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
The Reverend James Warren Jones
during his political heyday in San
Francisco. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Services at our San Francisco Temple on
Geary Street, circa 1976.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Annie graduating high school, 1972.
(COURTESY DR. REBECCA MOORE)
Sweet Annie (holding the rose) at Larry and
Carolyn’s wedding, 1967. Her sister Rebecca
Moore, who never joined the church, looks on.
(COURTESY DR. THOMAS LAYTON)
Annie as a registered nurse.
(COURTESY DR. REBECCA MOORE)
Maria, eighteen years old, with her horse, “Yoika,” a
Greek term of endearment. She fondly called her father
that as well, before disappearing from his life in 1971.
(COURTESY DR. STEVEN KATSARIS)
San Francisco Mayor George Moscone
shaking hands with the Reverend Jim Jones
after appointing him to the San Francisco
Housing Authority (unidentified committee
member in center).
CLEM ALBERS, SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE)
Annie on hotel bed before
leaving for Jonestown.
(COURTESY DR. REBECCA MOORE)
Carolyn and Kimo. (COURTESY DR. REBECCA MOORE)
Kimo, Jim and Carolyn’s son, before leaving
for Jonestown.
(COURTESY DR. REBECCA MOORE)
Mama with Annalisa’s son, David, two weeks
before we left for Jonestown, November 1977.
Four-year-old David answered my frantic “timed”
call from Georgetown when I was trying to escape
five months later.
(COURTESY ANNALISA LAYTON VALENTINE)
Sharon, Jim’s lieutenant in Georgetown.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
The Temple boat, the Cudjoe,
docked in Port Kaituma, five
miles from Jonestown.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
The flatbed truck.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
The Temple’s Georgetown headquarters,
viewed from the back, the radio room window
on the lower left. Around the corner from the
radio room were the main entry stairs up to
the living quarters of the house.
(COURTESY SAN FRANCISCO EXAMINER)
Laundry facilities in Jonestown.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Seniors sorting foraged plants.
; (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Gentle Mary, the sorceress of
delectable treats. (COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Innocent Shanda, before she was
silenced in the medical unit.
(COURTESY STEPHAN JONES)
Mark Blakey at the
Georgetown headquarters.
(DEBORAH LAYTON)
Lew, Beth, and their don Chioke (CHEE-oak) inside the nursery.
(DEBORAH LAYTON)