Jean Spangler
Encyclopedia
Jean Elizabeth Spangler (September 2, 1923 – disappeared October 7, 1949) was an American dancer, model and bit-part actress in Hollywood films and in early television
.
, Spangler had been with the Earl Carroll Theatre
and Florentine Gardens as a dancer. She lived with her mother, five-year-old daughter Christine (born April 22, 1944), brother Edward Spangler and sister-in-law Sophie, near Wilshire Boulevard
, in Los Angeles, California
.
Spangler had won custody of her daughter Christine in 1948 from her former husband, manufacturer Dexter Benner, (Mar 20, 1920 - May 7, 2007) whom she had married in 1942 and divorce
d in 1946.
payment that had been due a week before, then on to work on a movie set. The last person to see her was a clerk in a store near her home, who said she appeared to be waiting for someone. She has not been seen again. Spangler's mother was visiting family in Kentucky
at the time. Spangler's sister-in-law, Sophie, went to the police and filed a missing person report the next day.
Spangler had been through a long custody battle with her former husband and won custody of the child Christine in 1948. Dexter Benner, her former husband, had been awarded custody in 1946 at the time of the divorce. Police questioned Benner about her statement to her sister-in-law that she was going to meet him about the overdue child support payment. He said that he had not seen his former wife for several weeks before Spangler disappeared. His wife Lynn Lasky Benner stated that he was with her at the time of the disappearance. Benner and Lasky had been married only one month before Spangler's disappearance.
Two days later on October 9, Spangler's purse
was found near the entrance gate to Griffith Park
in Los Angeles with both of the straps on one side torn loose as if it had been ripped from her arm. Sixty police
officers and over one hundred volunteers searched the 4107 acres (16.6 km²) natural terrain park, but no other clues were found. There was no money in the purse (her sister-in-law said that she had no money when she left her house the evening of her disappearance) so the police ruled out robbery as a motive. There was an unfinished note in the purse addressed to a "Kirk," which read, "Can't wait any longer, Going to see Dr. Scott. It will work best this way while mother is away,...". The note ended with a comma as if it hadn't been finished.
Neither "Kirk" nor "Dr. Scott" could be located, and neither Spangler's family nor her friends knew anyone by those names. Spangler's mother, Florence, returned to Los Angeles and told police that someone named Kirk had picked up Jean at her house twice, but he stayed in his car and didn't come in. Police searched for Kirk and questioned every doctor with the last name Scott in Los Angeles, but none of them had a patient with the last name Spangler or Benner, Jean Spangler's former married name. Spangler had once been involved with a person she called Scotty, who had beaten her, threatening to kill her if she broke the relationship off, but her lawyer said she had not seen him since 1945.
Spangler had completed a bit part in the then unfinished film Young Man with a Horn
starring the actor Kirk Douglas
. Douglas was vacationing in Palm Springs
and heard about the disappearance. He called the police and told them he was not the Kirk mentioned in the note before police knew there was any connection. Douglas was interviewed by the head of the investigating team and stated that he had heard the name and that Spangler had been an extra in his new film, but he didn't know her personally.
Friends of Spangler told police that she was three months pregnant when she disappeared and that she had talked about having an abortion
, which was illegal at that time. The police talked with several people who frequented the same nightclubs and bars that Spangler did, who told them they had heard that there was a former medical student known as "Doc," who had said that he would perform abortions for money. Police searched for "Doc" with the idea that Spangler had gone to him to have an abortion and died as a result, but they not could locate him or anyone who would say that they had actually met him.
Spangler had been seen with Davy Ogul, an associate of Mickey Cohen
in Palm Springs, California, who disappeared two days after she did. This led police to investigate the possibility that Spangler and Ogul, who was under an indictment for conspiracy, had left to avoid prosecution. In 1950 a customs agent in El Paso, Texas
had reported seeing Ogul and a woman who looked like Spangler in a hotel
in El Paso. A hotel clerk in that city identified a picture of Spangler as having stayed in the hotel around that same time. Neither Davy Ogul nor Jean Spangler's name appeared on the hotel register and she could not be located in El Paso.
The Los Angeles Police department continued the search and circulated Spangler's picture for several years in an unsuccessful attempt to find her and any reliable information. There was a nationwide search for Spangler, but no further clues have ever turned up. People reported seeing her in Northern and Southern California, Phoenix, Arizona
and Mexico City
over the next two years, but none of those sightings could be validated. She is still listed as a missing person and the Los Angeles Police have not closed the case.
offered a one thousand dollar reward for information concerning Spangler's disappearance or location on television.
An episode of the now defunct television series Mysteries and Scandals
featured the case a few years ago.
Megan Abbott's 2007 noir novel, The Song is You, centres around the Spangler case.
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
.
Life and career
Born in Seattle, WashingtonSeattle, Washington
Seattle is the county seat of King County, Washington. With 608,660 residents as of the 2010 Census, Seattle is the largest city in the Northwestern United States. The Seattle metropolitan area of about 3.4 million inhabitants is the 15th largest metropolitan area in the country...
, Spangler had been with the Earl Carroll Theatre
Earl Carroll Theatre
Earl Carroll Theatre was the name of two important theaters owned by Broadway impresario and showman Earl Carroll. One was located on Broadway in New York City and the other on Sunset Blvd in Hollywood, California.-Broadway:...
and Florentine Gardens as a dancer. She lived with her mother, five-year-old daughter Christine (born April 22, 1944), brother Edward Spangler and sister-in-law Sophie, near Wilshire Boulevard
Wilshire Boulevard
Wilshire Boulevard is one of the principal east-west arterial roads in Los Angeles, California, United States. It was named for Henry Gaylord Wilshire , an Ohio native who made and lost fortunes in real estate, farming, and gold mining. Henry Wilshire initiated what was to become Wilshire...
, in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
.
Spangler had won custody of her daughter Christine in 1948 from her former husband, manufacturer Dexter Benner, (Mar 20, 1920 - May 7, 2007) whom she had married in 1942 and divorce
Divorce
Divorce is the final termination of a marital union, canceling the legal duties and responsibilities of marriage and dissolving the bonds of matrimony between the parties...
d in 1946.
Disappearance
On October 7, 1949, Spangler left her home in Los Angeles around five p.m., leaving her daughter with her sister-in-law and telling her that she was going to meet her former husband to talk about his child supportChild support
In family law and public policy, child support is an ongoing, periodic payment made by a parent for the financial benefit of a child following the end of a marriage or other relationship...
payment that had been due a week before, then on to work on a movie set. The last person to see her was a clerk in a store near her home, who said she appeared to be waiting for someone. She has not been seen again. Spangler's mother was visiting family in Kentucky
Kentucky
The Commonwealth of Kentucky is a state located in the East Central United States of America. As classified by the United States Census Bureau, Kentucky is a Southern state, more specifically in the East South Central region. Kentucky is one of four U.S. states constituted as a commonwealth...
at the time. Spangler's sister-in-law, Sophie, went to the police and filed a missing person report the next day.
Police investigation
Spangler had told her sister-in-law that she was going to work on movie set after she met with her former husband. She had worked as an extra and bit-part actress in movies for several different Hollywood studios. Police checked, but none of the studios had any work in progress or were even open the evening of October 7.Spangler had been through a long custody battle with her former husband and won custody of the child Christine in 1948. Dexter Benner, her former husband, had been awarded custody in 1946 at the time of the divorce. Police questioned Benner about her statement to her sister-in-law that she was going to meet him about the overdue child support payment. He said that he had not seen his former wife for several weeks before Spangler disappeared. His wife Lynn Lasky Benner stated that he was with her at the time of the disappearance. Benner and Lasky had been married only one month before Spangler's disappearance.
Two days later on October 9, Spangler's purse
Handbag
A handbag, or purse in American English, is a handled medium-to-large bag that is often fashionably designed, typically used by women, to hold personal items such as wallet/coins, keys, cosmetics, a hairbrush, pepper spray, cigarettes, mobile phone etc....
was found near the entrance gate to Griffith Park
Griffith Park
Griffith Park is a large municipal park at the eastern end of the Santa Monica Mountains in the Los Feliz neighborhood of Los Angeles, California. The park covers of land, making it one of the largest urban parks in North America...
in Los Angeles with both of the straps on one side torn loose as if it had been ripped from her arm. Sixty police
Police
The police is a personification of the state designated to put in practice the enforced law, protect property and reduce civil disorder in civilian matters. Their powers include the legitimized use of force...
officers and over one hundred volunteers searched the 4107 acres (16.6 km²) natural terrain park, but no other clues were found. There was no money in the purse (her sister-in-law said that she had no money when she left her house the evening of her disappearance) so the police ruled out robbery as a motive. There was an unfinished note in the purse addressed to a "Kirk," which read, "Can't wait any longer, Going to see Dr. Scott. It will work best this way while mother is away,...". The note ended with a comma as if it hadn't been finished.
Neither "Kirk" nor "Dr. Scott" could be located, and neither Spangler's family nor her friends knew anyone by those names. Spangler's mother, Florence, returned to Los Angeles and told police that someone named Kirk had picked up Jean at her house twice, but he stayed in his car and didn't come in. Police searched for Kirk and questioned every doctor with the last name Scott in Los Angeles, but none of them had a patient with the last name Spangler or Benner, Jean Spangler's former married name. Spangler had once been involved with a person she called Scotty, who had beaten her, threatening to kill her if she broke the relationship off, but her lawyer said she had not seen him since 1945.
Spangler had completed a bit part in the then unfinished film Young Man with a Horn
Young Man with a Horn (film)
Young Man with a Horn is a 1950 drama film based on a biographical novel of the same name aboutBix Beiderbecke, the legendary jazz cornetist...
starring the actor Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas
Kirk Douglas is an American stage and film actor, film producer and author. His popular films include Out of the Past , Champion , Ace in the Hole , The Bad and the Beautiful , Lust for Life , Paths of Glory , Gunfight at the O.K...
. Douglas was vacationing in Palm Springs
Palm Springs, California
Palm Springs is a desert city in Riverside County, California, within the Coachella Valley. It is located approximately 37 miles east of San Bernardino, 111 miles east of Los Angeles and 136 miles northeast of San Diego...
and heard about the disappearance. He called the police and told them he was not the Kirk mentioned in the note before police knew there was any connection. Douglas was interviewed by the head of the investigating team and stated that he had heard the name and that Spangler had been an extra in his new film, but he didn't know her personally.
Friends of Spangler told police that she was three months pregnant when she disappeared and that she had talked about having an abortion
Abortion
Abortion is defined as the termination of pregnancy by the removal or expulsion from the uterus of a fetus or embryo prior to viability. An abortion can occur spontaneously, in which case it is usually called a miscarriage, or it can be purposely induced...
, which was illegal at that time. The police talked with several people who frequented the same nightclubs and bars that Spangler did, who told them they had heard that there was a former medical student known as "Doc," who had said that he would perform abortions for money. Police searched for "Doc" with the idea that Spangler had gone to him to have an abortion and died as a result, but they not could locate him or anyone who would say that they had actually met him.
Spangler had been seen with Davy Ogul, an associate of Mickey Cohen
Mickey Cohen
Meyer Harris "Mickey" Cohen was a gangster based in Los Angeles and part of the Jewish Mafia, and also had strong ties to the American Mafia from the 1930s through 1960s.-Early life:...
in Palm Springs, California, who disappeared two days after she did. This led police to investigate the possibility that Spangler and Ogul, who was under an indictment for conspiracy, had left to avoid prosecution. In 1950 a customs agent in El Paso, Texas
El Paso, Texas
El Paso, is a city in and the county seat of El Paso County, Texas, United States, and lies in far West Texas. In the 2010 census, the city had a population of 649,121. It is the sixth largest city in Texas and the 19th largest city in the United States...
had reported seeing Ogul and a woman who looked like Spangler in a hotel
Hotel
A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. The provision of basic accommodation, in times past, consisting only of a room with a bed, a cupboard, a small table and a washstand has largely been replaced by rooms with modern facilities, including en-suite bathrooms...
in El Paso. A hotel clerk in that city identified a picture of Spangler as having stayed in the hotel around that same time. Neither Davy Ogul nor Jean Spangler's name appeared on the hotel register and she could not be located in El Paso.
The Los Angeles Police department continued the search and circulated Spangler's picture for several years in an unsuccessful attempt to find her and any reliable information. There was a nationwide search for Spangler, but no further clues have ever turned up. People reported seeing her in Northern and Southern California, Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix is the capital, and largest city, of the U.S. state of Arizona, as well as the sixth most populated city in the United States. Phoenix is home to 1,445,632 people according to the official 2010 U.S. Census Bureau data...
and Mexico City
Mexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
over the next two years, but none of those sightings could be validated. She is still listed as a missing person and the Los Angeles Police have not closed the case.
Media coverage
Columnist Louella ParsonsLouella Parsons
Louella Parsons was the first American news-writer movie columnist in the United States. She was a gossip columnist who, for many years, was an influential arbiter of Hollywood mores, often feared and hated by the individuals, mostly actors, whose careers she could negatively impact via her...
offered a one thousand dollar reward for information concerning Spangler's disappearance or location on television.
An episode of the now defunct television series Mysteries and Scandals
Mysteries and Scandals
Mysteries and Scandals is an American television program hosted by A.J. Benza. The series was originally broadcast on the E! network from March 1998 until February 2001.-Synopsis:...
featured the case a few years ago.
Megan Abbott's 2007 noir novel, The Song is You, centres around the Spangler case.
Filmography
- Miracle of the Bells (Uncredited, 1948)
- When My Baby Smiles at MeWhen My Baby Smiles at Me- Song :"When My Baby Smiles at Me", music by Bill Munro with words by Andrew B. Sterling and Ted Lewis, was published by Von Tilzer Publishing in 1920. It was the first big hit for clarinettist, vocalist and comedian Ted Lewis . Ted Lewis's jazz band recording in 1920, became his signature tune,...
(Uncredited, 1948) - Chicken Every SundayChicken Every SundayChicken Every Sunday is a 1949 American comedy film directed by George Seaton. The screenplay by Seaton and Valentine Davies is based on the 1944 play of the same title by Julius J. Epstein and Philip G...
(Uncredited, 1949) - Young Man with a HornYoung Man with a Horn (film)Young Man with a Horn is a 1950 drama film based on a biographical novel of the same name aboutBix Beiderbecke, the legendary jazz cornetist...
(Uncredited, 1950) - Wabash AvenueWabash AvenueWabash Avenue is a six-lane Boulevard in northwest Baltimore, Maryland, that runs from Patterson Avenue to Hilton Street, mostly through the Arlington community, crossing over Northern Parkway and Cold Spring Lane along the way...
(Uncredited, 1950) - Champagne for CaesarChampagne for CaesarChampagne for Caesar is a 1950 American comedy film about a radio quiz show, directed by Richard Whorf and written by Fred Brady and Hans Jacoby. The movie stars Ronald Colman, Celeste Holm, Vincent Price, Barbara Britton and Art Linkletter. The film was produced by Harry M...
(Uncredited, 1950) - The Petty GirlThe Petty GirlThe Petty Girl is a musical romantic comedy film starring Robert Cummings and Joan Caulfield. Cummings portrays painter George Petty.-Plot:...
(Uncredited, 1950)
External links
- Georgette Bauerdorf: Murder at El Palacio
- Court tv news
- Palm Springs Life: Mysterious Disappearance of Jean Spangler
- 1949 Los Angeles County Grand Jury Final report re Spangler and other missing persons
- The Song is You - A book about Jean Spangler
- The Song is You by Megan Abbott ISBN 0743291719 9780743291712
- The Doe Network -Jean Spangler
- The Charley Project-Jean Spangler
- Benner v. Benner (1952) Custody hearing
- Benner Silvex (Requires Pdf reader)