Echoes from Jonestown: The Life and Family of Lew Eric Jones

Basic Information

Life in Brief — a small life in a very large story

I first met Lew—on paper, at least—like a photograph that’s been handled a lot: edges softened, corners folded, but the face still speaking. Born November 23, 1956 in Seoul, Lew Eric Jones appears in the historical record as one of Jim and Marceline Jones’s adopted children, a young man who carried a child and, at 21, became part of a tragedy that reshaped headlines and memory. The numbers are stark: born 1956, fathered Chaeoke April 4, 1977, and died November 18, 1978; in those three lines you can read a lifetime of motion—birth, adoption, love, loss—compressed into dates.

He was one of the Korean children adopted into what the Jones family called a “rainbow” household—a deliberate image, cinematic in its intent, meant to suggest an experiment in multiracial family life in America. In reality, that image lived inside the larger, often darker story of the Peoples Temple and Jonestown; Lew shows up in those family lists and photographs more as a human touchpoint than as a public figure with a résumé or bank account. There are no corporate filings, no business bios, no net-worth estimates—Lew’s trace is human, not fiscal.

The Jones household — people who shared a name and a history

I like to imagine family histories as a table of faces where each row holds a story; below is that table rendered in plain facts — names, relationships, and the small notes that matter.

This is not a Hollywood cast list; these are people who shared kitchens, sleeping rooms, summers and winters, and—yes—headlines. The household was presented outwardly as an experiment in communal family life, and inwardly as a network where relationships were entangled with religious and political commitments. Names sit next to names in archives; when you start to read them aloud, the domestic textures return—dinners, arguments, small jokes, a child’s laughter—before the larger tragedy swallows the scene.

Dates, numbers, and hard facts (so the story doesn’t float away)

• Birth: November 23, 1956 (Seoul, South Korea).
• Son’s birth: Chaeoke Warren Jones — April 4, 1977 (Georgetown, Guyana).
• Death: November 18, 1978 (Jonestown, Guyana) — Lew recorded as age 21 at death.
• Household note: Lew is listed consistently as an adopted son of Jim and Marceline Jones.
• Public record: No independent career profile or documented net worth is available for Lew; his presence in the historical record is primarily familial and archival (photographs, lists, memorial entries).

Numbers do something strange—they make a life visible and finite. Here you have a lifespan that reads like a single breath: 1956–1978. Here you have a son born a little over a year before a family’s last days. Those dates are not merely calendar entries; they are a heartbeat pattern you can feel if you press your palm to the record.

Career, public life, and what’s not there

If you expect a CV, you will be disappointed. Lew did not leave behind executive titles, business ventures, or bank valuations. His presence in public materials comes from family listings and photographs—portraits of domestic life that later became evidence, memory, and mourning. In other words, Lew’s public identity is not professional; it’s intimate. He was a son, a partner, a father—roles that don’t translate into stock tickers or LinkedIn pages, but which, in the arc of history, hold their own weight.

Memory, images, and the social afterlife

There’s a curious modern phenomenon I’ve noticed: a photograph of a person can live longer than an obituary. Lew survives in scanned images, in captions, in community recollections—those small, glowing embers of online memory where people upload, caption, comment. Social threads mention him; genealogies list him; curated archives hold a photo of a man with a child in his arms, a domestic instant that reads as both ordinary and unbearably charged. That’s how people like Lew continue to travel across time: not as public figures, but as human traces that demand to be read, to be recognized.

FAQ

Who were Lew Eric Jones’s parents?

Lew is recorded as an adopted son of James Warren “Jim” Jones and Marceline Mae Baldwin Jones.

When and where was Lew Eric Jones born and when did he die?

He was born on November 23, 1956 in Seoul, South Korea, and died on November 18, 1978 in Jonestown, Guyana.

Did Lew Eric Jones have children?

Yes—he fathered a son, Chaeoke Warren Jones, who was born April 4, 1977.

Did Lew Eric Jones have a public career or known net worth?

No reliable records document a public career or net worth for Lew; his presence in archives is familial rather than professional.

Which siblings are listed alongside Lew in family records?

Siblings recorded among the Jones family include Stephan Gandhi Jones, James Warren Jones Jr., Timothy Glenn Tupper, Suzanne (Oboki) Jones, and Stephanie Jones.

Where does Lew most often appear in modern records?

Lew appears primarily in family lists, photographs, and memorial records that preserve the names and faces of the Jonestown household.