Brewster's father was Phillip Sloan Brewster, a trial lawyer in Missouri; her mother was Geraldine (née Craddock); she had an older brother, Paul. She was born in Kansas City, Missouri and went to Shawnee Mission High School. Her 1949 senior class yearbook lists a nickname, "Dissy". She was a Pep Club member, Class Secretary, Cheerleader and Homecoming Queen Attendant.[3] Later, Brewster studied liberal arts at the University of Kansas. Following her sophomore year at the university, she took a job as a secretary at a radio station.[4]
Career
Brewster moved to Los Angeles from the Kansas City area around 1955. Her first job in entertainment was as MC for a teenage radio program. Work in commercials, fashion commentary, and even weather programs soon followed.[4] In 1956, Brewster was the announcer on The Ina Ray Hutton Show, a variety program on NBC television.[1]: 502
On Maverick, Brewster's character is a gorgeous gambling con artist who often affects a southern accent to convince marks of her reliability, but is ultimately likable. Brewster first played the character in a 1956 episode of Cheyenne entitled "Dark Rider" before appearing opposite James Garner in the third episode of Maverick, "According to Hoyle". Her other Maverick appearances include "The Savage Hills" with Jack Kelly, "The Seventh Hand" with Garner, and the famous "Shady Deal at Sunny Acres" featuring both Kelly and Garner. According to his detailed interview for the Archive of American Television, writer/producer and series creator Roy Huggins had given her character his mother's maiden name.
She played Marilyn Hesselroth in the Bachelor Father episode, “Bentley and the Girl Scouts”, which aired September 29, 1957.
Brewster played Miss Canfield on Leave It to Beaver for the first season on CBS, 1957-1958, and for the 1980s television revivals. Brewster appeared in the show's pilot, "It's a Small World", as Miss Simms, a secretary with a dairy company, and in four regular season episodes as Miss Canfield. In Episode 1, she appears in the credits as "Diana Brewster", a mistake which was corrected in her next appearance in Episode 8. Brewster was replaced by Sue Randall as "Miss Landers" on the second season of Leave It to Beaver.[5]
In 1957, she co-starred with George Montgomery in the Western film Black Patch, playing his former and future love interest. On January 31, 1959, Brewster played Lisa Caldwell in the episode "Runaway Train" of NBC's Cimarron City Western television series starring George Montgomery.[6] That same year, Brewster appeared in The Young Philadelphians playing the mother of Paul Newman's character. (Newman was six years her senior.)
In 1960, Brewster had a starring role as Wilhelmina "Steamboat Willy" Vanderveer in The Islanders,[1]: 512-513 an hour-long adventure series set in the South Pacific, with William Reynolds and James Philbrook. That same year, she also portrayed the titular role in "The Lita Foladaire Story," an episode of Wagon Train with Ward Bond and silent film star Evelyn Brent, in which Brewster's character had been killed before the start of the show, with her sections of the story posthumously depicted in flashbacks. Brewster was also a guest star in 1965 on Wagon Train, appearing in "The Echo Pass Story" along with Jack Lord and James Caan, which aired on January 3, 1964.[7]: 453
Brewster appeared several times in flashbacks as the murdered wife Helen Kimble in The Fugitive, most prominently in Episode 14, The Fugitive (season 1), "The Girl from Little Egypt", broadcast December 24, 1963. She appeared in two episodes of Death Valley Days, in a 1966 episode of Family Affair, and in an installment of Ironside (1968) before retiring. She reappeared in four episodes of The New Leave It to Beaver.[8]
Personal life and death
In California, Brewster married Jabe Z. Walker, an oral surgeon from Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.[citation needed] They had a son, Dean C. Walker, and a daughter, Lynn D. Walker. Both children were born in Los Angeles. Jabe Walker died in February 2013.[9]
