Young Jonestown survivors lost everything, built new lives
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November 15, 2018
OAKLAND, Calif. (AP) — Jonestown was the highlight of Mike Touchette's life — for a time.
The 21-year-old Indiana native felt pride pioneering in the distant jungle of Guyana, South America. As a self-taught bulldozer operator, he worked alongside other Peoples Temple members in the humid heat, his blade carving roads and sites for wooden buildings with metal roofs. More than 900 people lived in the agricultural mission, with its dining pavilion, tidy cottages, school, medical facilities and rows of crops.
"We built a community out of nothing in four years," recalled Touchette, now a 65-year-o...
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