Laura Johnston Kohl was born on October 22, 1947 in Washington D.C. Her mother was an activist, a writer and wrote a column for the Washington Post. She raised Laura and her two older sisters as a single parent.
Laura grew up as an activist in Washington, D.C., and watched many of her heroes being assassinated in the 1960s. While she was in high school and college, John Kennedy, Bobby Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Malcolm X, Medgar Evers, and others were killed. That had a huge impact on her. She attended college in Connecticut and continued her commitment to work for change and to make a difference. While exercising her civil rights to protest peacefully, she was tear-gassed while protesting the war in Vietnam. After a brief marriage, a visit to Woodstock, and a stint working with the Black Panthers, she moved to California to join her sister.
Soon after that, she was introduced to Peoples Temple and spent the next nine years in California and Guyana. She was away from Jonestown on the day when 913 of her friends and family died. The next twenty years were spent recovering, and rebuilding her life. For the first ten years, she lived in Synanon, a residential community. The following ten years, with her husband, Ron Kohl and young son Raul, she began rebuilding her life. She earned her BA in philosophy/psychology, and then earned her California Teaching Credential. She also found some peace by becoming a Quaker.
She became a public speaker about Peoples Temple and was on the Speakers’ Bureau of the Jonestown Institute. She was interviewed locally, nationally, and internationally on television, on radio, in newspapers, in documentaries, and for research papers. She wrote many articles about the details of life in Peoples Temple and her survival in the annual Jonestown Report. Laura was an annual speaker at the Communal Studies Association Conference, and her scholarly work is published in their Communal Societies Journal. She made frequent presentations at universities, libraries, book stores, conferences, and on internet radio. She was interviewed on Ben Modo Live television show, and appeared in several documentaries on different aspects of Peoples Temple. Laura received a number of requests for interviews from all around the world every week. In March 2010, she published her own book, JONESTOWN SURVIVOR: An Insider’s Look.
Laura worked as a bilingual public school teacher and was nominated for “Teacher of the Year” by her middle school. She was chosen as "A Woman of the Year 2011-12" by the National Association for Professional Women. In October 2012, she was added to the Board of Directors of the Communal Studies Association. She was a member of Read Local San Diego, and Writers and Publishers of San Diego, as well as other authors' groups. In the last few years, after retiring from full-time public school teaching, she traveled extensively across the country from Hawaii to New York, and Seattle to Florida, speaking at universities about New Religions, survival, Peoples Temple & Jonestown, psychology, cults, Critical Thinking, writing, and the decades of the 1960s and 1970s – and the evolution of Peoples Temple during those twenty years. She also taught OSHER classes around the country and spoke at Quaker Meetings around the U.S. She was on the Advisory Committee of the California Historical Society's Peoples Temple Archives.
In San Diego Laura was active in many peace and justice activities with groups such as the Democratic Party, the American Civil Liberties Union, her teachers' union, and especially events that promoted racial understanding and justice for migrants. Laura had been active in La Jolla Meeting for over 20 years. Her loving presence was felt especially as she encouraged us to create a banner to take to events such as the Martin Luther King and LGBTQ parades. She had Quaker t-shirts printed for us to wear routinely and especially at public gatherings. We will miss her insistence on our being active in the community. She served on many committees, most of which were involved in peace, social action and immigration issues. She was on the SCQM Peace Committee for many years and was also very active in peace issues at Pacific Yearly Meeting.
Laura struggled with a debilitating cancer the last couple of years of her life but it didn’t stop her indomitable spirit. She remained active until her last days. Four days before her death, Laura’s husband Ron hosted a celebration of life at her home at her request. Over 130 people attended to say good-by. Laura will be remembered for her wide-open heart, optimism, passion for justice, and incredible energy. Her passing leaves a hole in the lives of her family, colleagues, and friends from all walks of life. Friends at La Jolla Meeting will miss her deeply.