Ann H. Kellett Brewer, 55; Launched New York Times in Russian

Ann H. Kellett Brewer, 55, a newspaper editor who helped launch the first foreign-language edition of the New York Times, died Sunday in Port Angeles, Wash., of cancer.

Raised in St. Louis and educated at the University of Missouri at Columbia and Paris’ Sorbonne, Brewer began her career in Sydney, Australia, where she worked for the Daily Telegraph and Cleo magazine in the early 1970s. She later held editing positions at the Fort Lauderdale News and Sun-Sentinel in Florida, the Register in Shrewsbury, N.J., and the Lesher Communications suburban papers in Contra Costa County, Calif.

In 1991 and 1992, she worked for the New York Times as founding editor of the New York Times News in Review, a biweekly paper in Russian. The publication was a joint venture with the Moscow News.

Subsequently, Brewer owned a New York gift wrapping business called Dream Baskets, and in Washington state operated A Kellett Brewer Design, taught communications at Peninsula College and was a counselor for the state Division of Vocational Rehabilitation.