M. Hughes Miller; Longtime Book Publisher

M. Hughes Miller, a longtime book publisher whose tenure as president of Bobbs Merrill Co. Inc. was marked by the publication of the best-selling “The Joy of Cooking,” died has after a yearlong battle with cancer.

He was 76 when he died Tuesday at St. Joseph Medical Center in Burbank.

Founder of the Weekly Readers Children’s Book Club, he was a prominent children’s book executive and recently had been offering an innovative Dial-a-Children’s Story service in which youngsters could hear tales over the telephone.

Narrating the series was Miller’s wife, actress Mala Powers.

Miller also recently published “The New Lexicon Dictionary of Basic Words,” a wordbook for children with color illustrations.

Miller, who started as a reporter for the Philadelphia Public Ledger in 1929, moved into book publishing in the 1930s with the old Charles E. Merrill Co. He founded the Weekly Readers Children’s Book Club in 1953 and over the years was a consultant to Random House, Thompson Publishing, Grosset & Dunlap and McGraw-Hill.

A funeral service will be held at 11:30 a.m. Saturday in the Old North Church at Forest Lawn Hollywood Hills.

He leaves his wife, two sons and six grandchildren.