Voting Station

Marceline Jones

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Celebrity's Relative

The Resume

    (January 8, 1927-November 18, 1978)
    Born in Wayne County, Richmond, Indiana
    Registered Nurse
    Birth name is Marceline Baldwin
    Health inspector of nursing homes for the State of California
    Wife of People's Temple leader, the Reverend James Warren 'Jim' Jones
    Resided in Indiana, then the Redwood Valley Ukiah Temple, and lastly Jonestown in Guyana
    Ran the Jonestown Medical committee, as well as the Jonestown children's nursery
    Participated in the Jonestown mass suicide/massacre orchestrated by her husband, committing suicide by drinking cyanide laced 'Kool-Aid' along with 908 others (Nov. 18,1978)

Why she might be annoying:

    She married a man four years her junior.
    She attempted suicide independently on at least one occasion.
    Temple members tended to call her 'mom' or 'mother.'
    She was accused of adopting mixed race children for publicity.
    She left all her possessions to the Communist Party of Russia in her will.
    She carried on private, years-long, feud with her husband's mistress, Carolyn Layton.
    She allegedly believed her husband had actual healing powers, when even some staff members knew they were staged.
    She lived in a luxurious air-conditioned condo in Jonestown, while most residents lived in ill-furnished huts.
    She was a key part in rounding up gullible parishioners to leave their homes and possessions to board a plane to Jonestown (without so much as a phone call to concerned loved ones).
    She agreed to maintain an image of a united front of marital bliss with Jones for the good of the Temple, but they slept in separate quarters.
    Many Jonestown residents naively believed that her growing frustration with her husband's infidelity would provide enough cause for Jonestown to close down.
    She tolerated her husband's hypocrisy when her word could have held serious weight (she only began openly challenging him when it was clear the whole project was going to fail).
    She took to a megaphone during the massacre, directing followers to line up for poisoned Kool-Aid and reiterating her husband's assurances that they would be departing for a better world by committing suicide.
    She went to great lengths to get her two oldest children, out of Jonestown in the lead-up to Jonestown's mass suicide, (nonetheless over 300 of the other residents' children died, including her other three children).

Why she might not be annoying:

    She was a better mother than Magda Goebbels (which isn't saying very much).
    She tended to lose friends, early on, by covering for Jim's behavior.
    She and Jim became the first caucasian couple in the state of Indiana to adopt an African-American child.
    She was once allegedly spat on by a woman who passed her while she was walking one of her adopted children.
    Her adopted daughter from South Korea died in a car accident in 1959.
    She first became attracted to Jim Jones (then a hospital orderly) when she saw him comfort a dead pregnant woman's family.
    Her husband likely characterized her as unstable to maintain control in the marriage (he even attempted to have her committed).
    She attempted to leave Jim twice, but was prevented from doing so because she could not take her children with her.
    She got so sick of her husband's drug addiction problems that she allegedly flushed his syringes down the toilet during a heated argument.
    She worked to get Jonestown residents off of the tranquilizers her husband's staff put them on.
    She and her eldest son made efforts to challenge her husband's cruelty but were frequently dismissed by aides as 'over emotional.'
    She was forced to endure the humiliation of her husband openly cheating on her during pavilion meetings, emotionally breaking down in some cases.
    She wanted to create a more tolerant world for her children (and was only the first of thousands to be taken in by <1105>Jim Jones's,/1105> bullshitting). Her death was reduced to a punch-line.

Credit: BoyWiththeGreenHair


Featured in the following Annoying Collections:

Year In Review:

    In 2023, Out of 199 Votes: 60.80% Annoying
    In 2022, Out of 3 Votes: 66.67% Annoying
    In 2021, Out of 20 Votes: 90.0% Annoying
    In 2020, Out of 25 Votes: 40.0% Annoying
    In 2019, Out of 40 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2018, Out of 149 Votes: 65.10% Annoying
    In 2017, Out of 22 Votes: 50.0% Annoying
    In 2016, Out of 9 Votes: 55.56% Annoying
    In 2015, Out of 26 Votes: 53.85% Annoying