70 Years Ago, Actress Jean Spangler Disappeared Leaving Only a Cryptic Note Behind

It seemed like it was written in the stars for Jean Elizabeth Spangler to become a real superstar. Born in Seattle, Washington on September 2nd, 1923, Jean grew up during a time when Hollywood was evolving into the center of the entertainment industry and her family could see from an early age that she had what it took to succeed.

Eventually, the Spanglers packed their bags and set off for L.A. Fast forward 26 years later though, and the now-aspiring actress was nowhere to be seen…

It didn’t take long for Jean Spangler to make an impact wherever she went in Hollywood. During her young adulthood, she tried her luck in a variety of vocations, working as a model, a dancer, and also as a part-time actress.

In the space of just two years, Spangler managed to appear in seven movies, including the likes of Chicken Every Sunday and When My Baby Smiles at Me, indicating that she had a bright future ahead of herself.

It wasn’t just Jean Spangler’s professional life that was full of twists and turns around this time. She also had an active social life, hanging out with the best that Hollywood had to offer. It was also around this time that she met arguably the most important man in her life, Dexter Benner.

It didn’t take long for the pair to hit it off and fall in love. At just 19 years of age, Jean tied the knot with Dexter and things were going well, for a few years, at least.

Despite her active life in Hollywood, Jean Spangler was always excited about the prospect of building a family and she was able to do this with her husband Dexter Benner.

A couple of years after tying the knot, the couple welcomed their first and only child into the world – a daughter by the name of Christine Louise Benner. She was born on April 22nd, 1944, which was arguably the happiest day in the couple’s marriage. But things started to fall apart.

For a few years there, Jean and Dexter seemed to look like an idyllic Hollywood couple, especially now that they had Christine in their lives. However, not everything was what it seemed and soon enough, the cracks began to show.

Things started to turn sour for the couple and it was just a matter of time before they decided that they no longer wanted to be together. From the outside, it was difficult to determine what had gone wrong between Jean and Dexter.

According to Dexter Benner, the main reason that things fell apart between him and Jean Spangler was that he claimed that she was unfaithful to him. Moreover, he accused her of spending too much of her time on the partying scene and not being there for their daughter.

However, the aspiring actress denied such claims and said that she was busy working at the clubs in question, trying to make a living for her family. Despite this, Benner won custody over Christine.

Despite Benner winning this intense custody battle, Jean Spangler wasn’t going down without a fight. She was insistent that she had done nothing wrong and that she deserved to be a part of her daughter’s life.

Although she claims to have done nothing wrong, she knew she needed to change some aspects of her life, staying away from the clubs and adopting a more formal image. Jean was hellbent on making sure that she could regain custody of her daughter.

Even though Jean Spangler had completely cleaned up her image and was working hard to earn her place in her daughter’s life, Dexter wasn’t having any of it. He made sure that his ex-wife had no access to seeing Christine and stubbornly prevented her from doing so.

There was only so much of this that Jean could take before she completely lost her patience. Eventually, she decided to take Dexter back to court, which ended up producing some surprising outcomes.

The moment that Dexter was alerted about Jean’s intention to take him back to court, he personally threatened her, claiming that he would do everything in his power to make sure that she’d never see Christine again.

These threats ended up backfiring against Dexter and sabotaged his claims to have full custody. The judge decided that Jean had reformed as a person, while on the flipside, Dexter had regressed. This only meant one thing for Jean and Christine.

Just like that, the judge ruled that Jean Spangler would now have full custody of Christine instead. And this time, Jean wasn’t going to let Dexter come between her and her daughter.

In order to raise her child in a safe environment, she moved to live with her mother and her sister. For a brief moment, it seemed like Jean had finally got the break she needed and now had everything in place to push on with her career in Hollywood.

Jean’s newfound happiness with her daughter was short-lived when the defining day of her life approached. On October 7, 1949, it was supposed to be a normal day for Jean. She had left home at 5pm and nobody thought much of it.

However, people in her life started to get worried when a whole night passed without her returning. It is a day riddled in mystery and the following days, weeks and months would prove to be extremely stressful for those closest to her.

During that fateful day, Jean seemed to have a busy schedule. As a result, she would need somebody to take care of Christine while she was out. Her mother, who would usually fill in for her, was unavailable that day as she was out of town visiting relatives.

So Jean asked her sister Sophie if she was free, to which she wholeheartedly obliged. It turns out that Jean was going to meet Dexter to hash out a new child support agreement.

Jean was also planning on going to her studio that evening and after a few hours of being away from home, she called Sophie on the phone. She told her that she would be running a bit late that evening. Moreover, she confirmed that she wouldn’t be back until the following day.

To close off the phone call, she said goodnight to bother her sister and Christine. The next day came along though and it was only then that Sophie realized that something was up.

As far as Sophie was concerned, she was happy to just be taking care of Christine and had complete faith that Jean would be back that next day to pick up her daughter. However, she never did.

There was no second phone call and it was just a matter of time before Sophie suspected that something was wrong. It simply wasn’t like Jean to be absent for this long. She finally mustered up the courage to pick up the phone and call the police.

After contacting the police and expressing her concerns, Sophie proceeded to the local police station and filed a missing person’s report. She simply couldn’t risk waiting any longer and had to do something about it.

In it, she shared everything she knew about what Jean was intending on doing while away from Christine and also generally what she was like as a person. With all of this information, the cops knew where to go first and who to turn to.

After inspecting Sophie’s missing person’s report, the police started to cover the entire neighborhood and beyond, contacting everyone in Jean Spangler’s life and asking them where and when they last saw her. They contacted everyone from her best friends and relatives to co-stars and Hollywood executives.

The police knew that any person in Jean’s life could have answers as to her whereabouts. And while they treated everyone with an open mind, there were some people who were more useful than others.

Obviously, the police were quick to contact Jean’s ex-husband, Dexter Benner. However, all he could tell them was that he had no idea where she was and that he hadn’t heard from her at all. In fact, he explained that despite her side of the story, he had never scheduled to meet up with her.

This conflicting piece of information certainly dumbfounded both Dexter and the police and neither could completely trust the other. And things were only going to get more confusing.

Another place that made sense for the police to contact was the studio that Jean said she was planning on visiting. When they arrived there, they discovered that it wasn’t open. They also managed to get in touch with the studio managers.

However, when they asked them the standard questions, they were shocked to learn that studio hadn’t been open in weeks. Moreover, they revealed that they hadn’t seen Jean for a long time, especially since it was off-season.

Between the facts that Dexter hadn’t planned to meet Jean and that the studio had been closed for weeks, the police had no idea who to trust and what to believe. They then drew conclusions that Jean must have lied to her family about her initial plans.

Of course, Dexter may have lied in order to cover his own tracks. But seeing that the studio plans was clearly a lie, who was to say that the meeting with Dexter wasn’t too?

Another person who the police decided to question was Dexter’s new wife, Lynn. Amazingly, she confirmed to them that he had been by her side the entire time during the evening that Jean had disappeared. Never had he left or made plans to go out that evening.

While they had no reason not to believe her, the police were frustrated as it led them to another dead end and they were desperate to find another lead. They kept on working hard until something else came along.

After a couple of days of searching and going around in circles, the police felt like they had presented the photo of Jean Spangler to everyone in the city. It turns out though that there was a potential lead fairly close to her home.

A clerk who worked at one of the stores she frequently shopped for groceries at took one glimpse at the photo and immediately recognized her. However, that wasn’t all he said about Jean.

The random store clerk didn’t just recognize Jean after he saw the photo of her. He also provided a really fascinating insight into how he knew her and a recent encounter he had with her. He claimed that he had seen her the day before she went missing.

And that’s not all. When she was at the store, it appeared to the clerk that Jean was waiting for someone. However, he couldn’t recall when she had left the store, or who she had left the store with.

During that day, the police had no idea how to use this information to further the investigation. Sure, it’s great that they were able to add this detail to their findings, but they were no closer to finding Jean.

Then, on October 9th, just two days after she had gone missing, someone found Jean’s purse near the Fern Dell entrance of L.A.’s Griffith Park. It had been found in the dirt and had obvious signs of wear and tear.

Based on the torn strap on the purse, the police immediately assumed that a burglary had taken place. Without haste, they contacted Sophie and alerted her about their findings.

However, Sophie was quick to respond to their alert, informing them that Jean hadn’t put any money in her purse during the day that she left the house. So if she had not been robbed and the purse was tattered and in the dirt, what could have possibly happened?

As soon as Sophie provided the police with this information, they once again resumed their investigation, launching a search party that consisted of 60 policemen and a staggering 100 volunteers.

Together, all of these people arrived at the park and searched all 4,000 acres of it. And yet, after hours of searching and leaving no stone unturned, not one person managed to find any body. However, they did manage to find one other thing that belonged to her.

Amazingly, one of the searchers stumbled across a note that Jean had written. Sophie confirmed that it was her handwriting and she also wrote her name on it. It was addressed to a man named “Kirk.” “Can’t wait any longer, Going to see Dr. Scott.

It will work best this way while mother is away,” she wrote in the note. This posed many questions for the police. Who was this mysterious man called “Kirk?” And why was Jean visiting a doctor in secret?

While the note was clearly unfinished, it provided plenty of clues and leads for the police to pursue. For a start, the police believed that it was about time that they got in touch with Jean’s divorce lawyer.

Seeing that the note was written to someone other than her ex-husband Dexter, maybe the lawyer would have some insights into people that Jean may have been seeing in private. Needless to say, he had some fascinating details to share.

When interviewed by the police, the divorce lawyer revealed that Jean had been in close contact with a man called “Scotty,” even when she was still married to Dexter. However, it is believed that she had not been in touch with this man since 1945.

Apparently, he did not treat her well and presented her with all kinds of threats if she had left him. Although she had the strength to break things off with him, there is a chance that he might have come back to haunt her.

Eventually, Jean’s mother returned from seeing her family and was met with a million phone calls from police and volunteers alike. When the cops asked her all the questions related to her daughter’s whereabouts, she claimed that Jean had been picked up on numerous occasions by a man she didn’t know, but whose name was Kirk.

While this didn’t necessarily confirm anything, this hinted at something that could have potentially been huge in working out what could have happened to Jean.

Amazingly, police were not ruling out the possibility that the “Kirk” that Jean Spangler was referring to was none other than Kirk Douglas, the iconic Hollywood superstar. Of course, Jean had recently worked alongside Kirk in the movie Young Man with a Horn.

While she played an extra, this didn’t rule out the chance that she had been in contact with Douglas. When asked about her, the actor confirmed that he had engaged in some harmless flirting with Jean, but nothing more.

A week passed before the next person came forward with some information surrounding the events leading to Jean’s disappearance. Her friend/confidante, actor Robert Cummings, informed the police that she had previously opened up to him about an affair she had, but didn’t choose to share the person’s name.

When he asked her if it was serious, she said the following: “No. But I’m having the time of my life.” So they questioned all of Jean’s social circle to find more answers.

As the police went from one friend to the next, they eventually stumbled across some alarming information that also added another layer to this puzzling story. One of Jean’s friends alerted the police that they believed she was three months pregnant. But that’s not all.

They also claimed that she had considered having the baby terminated, which was illegal at the time. This certainly provided the cops with some fresh leads and this led to some more details that could have hinted at her reasons for disappearing.

With this new piece of information, the police started to look around the bars that Jean would frequently visit to see if they could find anyone else that knew similar details. Eventually, they were informed about a former medical student who was referred to as “Doc.”

He had developed notoriety for terminating unwanted pregnancies. This led to the theory that the aspiring actress had contacted Doc and surgical complications resulted in her tragic demise. But was this actually true?

The cops started to put two and two together, assuming that “Scott” was the doctor she had approached in order to illegally terminate her pregnancy. So they contacted every doctor in L.A. by the name of “Scott.” However, none of these people had Jean in their books.

It didn’t take long before this plausible theory became null and void. Also, the struggle that led to her tattered purse didn’t line up with the theory, so they were back to square one.

It was at this point just a couple of weeks into the investigation that the Los Angeles Police Department had already run out of leads. They were in a dead-end and didn’t know how to take the investigation forward.

However, a nationwide search continued for the following years, with Jean’s photos being passed around the country and beyond. Soon enough though, there were a number of incidents where people around the country claimed to have spotted the missing actress.

One of the early supposed sightings of Jean came in Palm Springs, California. It was believed that she was hanging out with a notorious gangster of the time by the name of Davy Ogul.

He was facing indictment for conspiracy at the time and the police suspected that Ogul was trying to avoid prosecution. Moreover, they suspected he had abducted Jean. The fact that he disappeared just two days after she did also lent credence to the theory.

It was just a matter of months before another supposed sighting of Jean and Ogul reached the attention of the police. In El Paso, Texas, a customs agent claimed to have spotted Ogul hanging out in a hotel with a women who matched the picture of Jean.

In fact, a clerk from the hotel also confirmed that a similar-looking woman had stayed there around that time. Despite this, neither Ogul nor Jean had checked in, leading the cops to another dead-end.

Jean Spangler’s connections to Davy Ogul were obsessed over by historian Jon Lewis, who did plenty of investigating about the two and how they may have been entangled. He compiled all of his findings in the book Hard-Boiled Hollywood: Crime and Punishment in Postwar Los Angeles.

He made the point that Jean must have been connected to Ogul from her early work dancing in Florentine Gardens, a nightclub that was run by gangsters. And that’s not all.

The connections to Davy Ogul didn’t end there either. It is also believed that Ogul was a close friend of fellow gangster Mickey Cohen. The man from Brooklyn, in turn, was closely linked to Lynn, who was the second wife of Dexter, Jean’s ex-husband.

It was a fascinating six degrees of separation that simply couldn’t have been a coincidence. However, this didn’t exactly provide any evidence that Ogul and Jean’s fates were intertwined. The search carried on for many more decades.

Fast forward 70+ years and the disappearance of Jean Spangler still hasn’t been unraveled. While there were some reports here and there from people who claimed to have seen her throughout the West Coast, there was no legal verification or evidence to back up these claims.

In 2020, Jean Spangler has still listed as a missing person and the case is still very much wide open. All that is left is that cryptic note that she left behind in the park all those years ago.