Hollywood actress Jean Spangler left her Hollywood apartment on October 7, 1949, kissed her five-year-old daughter goodbye, and vanished without a trace — launching one of old Hollywood’s most haunting unsolved mysteries.
Spangler told her sister-in-law she was heading to work. This was a normal routine for an aspiring actress. She often took small film roles and nightclub gigs that ran late into the night. She never came home.
Two days later, a chilling clue surfaced. Jean’s purse was discovered in Griffith Park, a sprawling hillside park overlooking Los Angeles. Inside was a torn note that would pull one of the biggest stars in Hollywood into the investigation.
The note read:
“Kirk, Can’t wait any longer. Going to see Dr. Scott. It will work best this way while the mother is away.”
The name immediately raised alarms. “Kirk” was widely believed to refer to Kirk Douglas. He had just starred alongside Jean in the 1949 film Young Man with a Horn. She appeared as an extra in the film.
Douglas contacted police himself after learning about the note. Speaking to The San Bernardino Sun at the time, he said he barely remembered Spangler. He recalled only a brief, casual interaction on set. He insisted he never saw her before or after filming and had no personal relationship with her. Investigators ultimately found no evidence tying him to her disappearance.
Before the note surfaced, police had focused on Jean’s ex-husband, plastics manufacturer Dexter Benner. The two married in 1942. They divorced just six months later after Jean cited cruelty. Then they drifted in and out of each other’s lives. They shared a daughter and were locked in a bitter custody battle when Jean vanished.
Benner was questioned but claimed he hadn’t seen Jean for weeks — and investigators believed him. Suspicion faded quickly after the purse and note were found.
Jean’s career had been inching forward in the year before she disappeared. She picked up small roles in films. These included The Miracle of the Bells and When My Baby Smiles at Me. She continued to chase her big break in Hollywood.
Despite extensive searches and questioning, Jean Spangler’s body was never found. The case remains officially open with the Los Angeles Police Department, and speculation has only grown darker over the decades.
Some believe the note hinted at an illegal abortion, which was both dangerous and underground in 1949. Others have pointed fingers at the mysterious “Dr. Scott,” notorious mobster Mickey Cohen, or even the still-unidentified Black Dahlia killer, whose reign of terror gripped Los Angeles around the same time.
Many observers continue to suspect Benner. This suspicion grew after he was granted full custody of their daughter just weeks after Jean disappeared. He later moved to Florida and reportedly ignored a court order granting partial custody to Jean’s mother. Benner died in 2007, taking whatever he knew with him.
More than 75 years later, Jean Spangler’s disappearance remains one of Hollywood’s most unsettling cold cases. It is a story of ambition and secrets. It tells of a woman who walked out one night and was never seen again.
Leave a Reply