I was in one of my favorite places – the Central Library in downtown Los Angeles – when I first learned about the murder of Cecil Wells in Fairbanks, Alaska in 1953. Flicking through the newspaper archives, I read that the prime suspect in the case, Cecil’s wife Diane, took her life in a Hollywood hotel a month before the trial.
Back in Fairbanks she was due to face charges of first-degree murder alongside Johnny Warren, a Black musician that she had allegedly had an affair with. In 1950’s Jim Crow America, this sex scandal was bigger than the murder itself.
That Diane was glamorous blonde some twenty years younger than Cecil made it even more of a media sensation, and the story hit Newsweek, Life, Jet, Ebony and the pulp detective magazines, a rare thing for then-territorial Alaska, which rarely made the news in what its inhabitants still call the Lower 48.
Yet the case never came to trial, and seemed to be officially unsolved.
As with every good murder mystery I now wanted answers, but I knew I was probably the wrong person to find out more about this cold case. For a start it happened nearly 70 years ago, and the main people involved were surely dead, if not of a very advanced age.
More than that, within the true crime genre it’s often people with a direct connection to the case – a family member, a detective, a journalist, a surviving victim – who tend to put pen to paper. They really have a motive to seek out the truth.
Even so, I wondered what happened to Johnny Warren, or to Mark, the young son of Cecil and Diane? What happened on the night of the murder? Who pulled the trigger?
Thinking that this might make an interesting vintage true crime piece for an LA newspaper or magazine, I was lucky enough to quickly locate Mark Wells senior, now in his mid-70s. He seemed keen to discuss his tragic orphanhood, and told me he had “been waiting his whole life to tell this story,” and that he had done his own research for years.
Job done I thought, until two weeks later when he wrote me a short but polite letter bowing out of any involvement. By then however, I was hooked.
I managed to contact other family members via Ancestry and Facebook, but they all told me it had been a taboo subject. There were lots of theories, and they still wanted answers, even if it had happened so long ago: would I let them know what I found out?
Now I had a responsibility, and a very real motive. I only came across a few people wanted to let sleeping dogs lie, and I understood that. After all, it wouldn’t bring Diane or Cecil back.
The next step was to visit the scene of the crime. There’s no direct flight to Fairbanks from LAX (everything goes through Seattle when you are bound for the Far North), but I’m glad I went, as it was utterly invaluable for my research.
Believe or not, on the very first day I went into the local Noel Wien Library and asked at the reference desk: “You’ve probably never heard of it, but…”. The lady behind the desk replied that her sister had been married to one of the Wells children, and they talked about the murder quite often back in the day. Would I like to see her notes?
You almost had to pick me up off of the floor.
I also went to Texas to meet Diane’s eldest daughter, from who she was estranged. Amazingly, she lived barely twenty minutes away from John Warren junior. He was actually younger than I, as Johnny senior had become a father in his sixties.
Also crucial were the daughters of a US Marshal who worked on the case. They gave me some of his unpublished memoirs, unique photographs of him and Johnny Warren, and a mugshot of William Colombany, the so-called “Third Suspect.”
After about five years work The Alaskan Blonde was published. I was terrified what the reaction would be among those family members, especially to the last chapter, which is my account of what I think happened on the night of the murder. Their response was more important than sales or the longshot of awards.
Perhaps the most significant feedback was from Mark Wells junior, who I had got to know well during the research process, and still exchange emails with today. He had been estranged from his father for decades for good reason, and had done much soul-searching about it.
He said the book had been interesting, helpful and healing, even though he must have read that I spoke to his father. He’s never mentioned it, however. After all, he had the same phone number I had used to call him.
I also helped reunite half-brothers who had been out of contact for many years, and then, just a week or two ago, I got an email from Cecil’s great granddaughter. I interviewed her father for the book, and he had supplied me with many family photos. She told me he had been excited to read the book but, unknown to me, had died just before it came out.
Recently she had been thinking about it, and got in touch. I immediately sent her a signed copy, and she was thrilled that she could literally pass the story on to her children. Maybe that was job done, I thought.
And the fact that I was English not American or Alaskan? Having an accent actually made me a bit of a novelty, and despite some initial understandable wariness, almost everyone I talked to was simply surprised – and then happy – that I cared about a story they felt had been swept aside and forgotten.
Oh, and I’ve been back to Fairbanks twice since that first time. And I plan to visit again, because now I have friends there.
Anthony Award-nominated, National Indie Excellence and PSWA Award Winner James T. Bartlett is originally from London, but has been living in Los Angeles since 2004.
As a travel/lifestyle journalist and historian he has written for the Los Angeles Times, BBC, Los Angeles Magazine, LA Daily News, ALTA California, LA Weekly, High Life, Hemispheres, Westways, Frommers, Crime Reads, American Way, Atlas Obscura, The Guardian, Daily Mirror, Real Crime, Variety, PBS SoCal, Westways, AARP Magazine, The National (Scotland), Thrillist, Ripperologist Magazine, Sunday Life, History Ireland, Tolucan Times and Bizarre, among others. You can find more examples of his work here
His fictional short story “Death Under The Stars” was included in the 2023 Sisters in Crime LA anthology Entertainment To Die For, and he is also the author of the three Gourmet Ghosts alternative guides to the history, architecture, crimes and ghost stories behind some of the city’s oldest bars, restaurants and hotels.
The books led to lectures, events, book club hosting, and appearances on radio, podcasts, and television shows including Ghost Adventures and The UnXplained, and he is available for interviews/book clubs etc via Zoom about Gourmet Ghosts and The Alaskan Blonde.
