'Blonde' is simply what was known as the colour of 'Danish' or Scandinavian' furniture, popular in America after WWII. Leo just called it Blonde. In the pic of the original 1950 Broadcaster below you can see the colour as it was under the pickguard.
In 1954 (possibly because it looked nicer on TV, maybe because it was cheaper) they went to a limed (hand applied white finish) under lacquer which had the name changed to Blond, along with the change to a white pickguard. That is what the MIM 1950s classic tele is emulating. No 'e'. As on this 1962
Blonde and Blond were always applied over ash to show the grain. The reason the Scandinavians and Fender used a transluscent rather than a fully transparent paint is
probably so you could fog it thicker on to hide nasty surface flaws or joins, which let you use wood which is otherwise questionable in appearance. Many people are convinced their Blond(e) Tele is one piece when it is often 2 or 3. This colour was offered right up until Fullerton was closed in 1983 and is today, always over ash.
What most people confuse with Butterscotch and Blond(e) is actually this:
That is aged Olympic White on alder. This guitar is not wearing it's pickguard, the white area is the original colour as applied to the body and headstock.
That is as someone noted, Oly White is opaque paint - no grain visible, because alder is not that attractive with more flaws and hence cheaper. It is why Leo went to it, along with a scarcity of the enough good, light swamp ash.
Where confusion also came in was when the Japanese and especially Hoshino (Ibanez), with their early Tele copies, who went on to make Japan Fenders coped early Oly white ones. They copied the 'aged' finish so new Fender Squires in the 1980s were 'butterscotch'. They also used sen (which is a yellowish Asian ash) with clear, and later on ambered ash to replicate age. There were natural finish ash Teles from Fender very early on. They have aged to orangey, but would have been quite pale to start with.
New early 50's Blonde would have been a similar colour to this webpage, with necks nearly as white as new Fenders. The lacquer has just aged to the darker finish you see today. From 1954 Blond (501) became a standard colour and survived the change to poly. Below is my 1978 Blond with the original colour under the pickguard. Even the neck on this guitar has gone quite orange, and it's poly.
This info is from this oft-quoted article:
Fender Custom Colours