The manuscripts, ephemera, and artifacts series contains a diverse selection of materials produced or maintained by the Publications Department. Some, such as a substantial group of Temple newsletters and mailers, document the Department's daily work. Others, such as a collection of members' biographies from Jonestown and the manuscript of a book by member (and later defector) Teri Buford documenting potential conspiracies against the Temple, speak of the Department's sense of a broader mandate for presenting the Temple's work to the world. The series also contains clippings from mainstream newspapers documenting Temple activities, a small selection of personal documents and correspondence relating to the Jones family, late Jonestown correspondence, pamphlets, press releases, a Temple hymnal, and various other ephemera. The series will be of interest to researchers who wish to explore the Temple's self-image as well as its outward image. Though these materials are an incomplete record of the Temple's internal life, they effectively suggest how broad its range of self-representations was -- from the cheerful prosperity gospel of the monthly mailers, to the determined witnessing of the Jonestown testimonials, to the grievances of the conspiracy book.