MoNo Encore: The Murder of Cecil Wells w/ James T. Bartlett

Most Notorious! A True Crime History Podcast

Erik Rivenes

History, True Crime, Education

4.7 • 2.9K Ratings

🗓️ 22 May 2026

⏱️ 99 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

(Orig pub date: 6/21/22) In the early morning hours of October 17, 1953, a frightened, battered woman named Diane Wells told a horrific tale to police. She said intruders had broken into the top-floor penthouse apartment she shared with her husband Cecil, murdered him, beat her, and then made their escape. It was an especially sensational story because 31-year-old "blonde bombshell" Diane Wells was nicknamed "the most beautiful woman in Alaska", and Cecil (twenty years her senior) was a wealthy and well-known Fairbanks businessman. There were suspicions, however, that Diane was lying. It was soon learned that she was having an affair with a local musician and also being comforted by a dance instructor who worked downstairs. My guest is James T. Bartlett, author of "The Alaskan Blonde: Sex, Secrets, and the Hollywood Story that Shocked America". He shares details from his research into the almost 70 year old cold case, including an account of Diane's own tragic end. More information about the author can be found at these links: https://www.gourmetghosts.com/ https://www.facebook.com/thealaskanblonde https://www.instagram.com/thealaskanblonde https://www.twitter.com/alaskanblonde53 30% off sitewide at Batch! Go here and support the show: ⁠⁠⁠⁠hellobatch.com/NOTORIOUS⁠⁠⁠⁠ and use the code NOTORIOUS at checkout. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:27.7	Some follow the noise. Bloomberg follows the money. Because behind every headline is a bottom line.
0:35.7	Whether it's the funds fueling AI or crypto's trillion dollar swings,
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0:56.1	Hey everyone, Eric here.
1:02.5	So for this month's most notorious encore episode, I went back to one of my favorite interviews.
1:03.6	This is a cold case that has everything.
1:06.7	And I mean, literally a cold case.
1:09.7	We're talking Alaska here. We've got a wealthy businessman shot dead, his much younger, blonde and glamorous wife as a suspect. A jazz musician accused of being both her lover and an accomplice and a story that ends with a tragic Hollywood death.
1:30.0	This sounds like it could have been ripped straight from a 1950s pulp detective magazine.
1:35.5	And that's because it appeared in magazines like that, along with newspapers across the country.
1:40.7	The story was huge, absolutely sensational.
1:44.0	I got some great feedback when this
1:45.7	episode first came out in June of 2022. So here we are once more with the story of Diane Wells
1:52.4	and the murder of her husband, Cecil Wells, with author James Bartlett.
2:28.2	Thank you. James Bartlett with me.
2:37.4	Originally from London, he is a journalist, historian, and author who has been living in Los Angeles since 2005.
	...

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