In 1972 a lot of things happened. The President of the United States ”Richard Nixon” and his administration, tried to cope with its collaboration in the Watergate Scandal.
NASA’s Space Shuttle launched a program called ”Price is Right” and Bob Bakar was the host of this show, who gave cars, worth less than $4000. It was the programmer that NASA officially launched.
In the same way, Bob Barker is an entertainment icon, and a Multigenerational celebrity, who hosted this powerful show for 35 years.
The year the legendary artist is going to celebrate a century of life.
He grew up in an Indian misgiving in South Dakota. He was a member of the Sioux Tribe.
Bob Barker, first met his future wife Dorothy Jo Gideon at an Ella Fitzgerald concert.
He married his high school true love, Gideon in 1947 when he was on leave from the United States Navy Reserve. He was trained as a fighting pilot during World War II. He never performed any active duty and returned to the University where he graduated with an economics degree.
When Barker was hosting a radio show in Los Angeles, Ralph Edwards a game show producer searching for a new host for his game show name, Truth or Consequences. It was the first game show which would be broadcast on TV. He hosted the show from 1956 to 1975, a very popular show, and this show increased the popularity of Barker. After that, he offered to host the Miss Universe and Miss USA pageants, and he started to host both shows.
And then surprisingly he came on the stage of The Price is Right, which introduced him and the show to renown.
In 1988, Barker won 14 Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Game Show Host and 4 Emmy Awards as an executive director of this show. Actually, ”The Price is Right ” became the longest-running show in history, and Barkar, a titleholder of this show, was handled as executive producer.
In an interview with the Television Academy Foundation in 2008, Barker credits his passed wife for his successful career, saying “She gave me the confidence to even try to do what I set out to do. She didn’t just urge me on, she worked right at my side.”
Gideon died in 1987 due to cancer of lunges when she was 59 years old. she left her husband 36 years behind.
“I never had any inclination to remarry. She was my wife.” Barker said.
However, he finds another partner ”Nancy Burnet” who has been with him last 40 years. Nancy claimed that the essential element of Barker’s good health is less use of medicine over the years.
Before his 99th birthday, Burnet who is 79, gave an amazing statement to Fox News Digital:
“He’s going to be 99, and he takes one prescription medication and that’s for his thyroid. And his health care or anyone who comes in to see him, they’ll say, ‘Well, we’d like a list of his medications.’ I’ll say, you know, let me just show you the bottle. That’s it. So, he does not take anything for blood pressure, cholesterol, the umpteen other things that most people take as they grow older,” said Burnet, joking about his one prescription:
“He’s in very good health for his age and his humor is still in good shape. He’s had a very charmed life.”
In 1990, finding some inflexibility in his hand, Barker had surgery on his partially blocked artery. In 2002 had prostate surgery and some months later he had a stroke. He’s also had several cases of mild skin cancer, a series of falls requiring more hospital visits, and major back problems.
Burnet said, “It was not to replace meals but to enhance everything. To take that in addition to his meals because he was not doing well. He looked tired and frail, not just not looking healthy. And, you know, if you’re going to be a vegetarian and vegan, you better know what you’re doing.”
The ”Price is Right” is now hosted by famous comedian Drew Carey but even after retiring from this show Barker gave some guest appearances even his 90th birthday in 2013.
Burnet said of his time on the show, “He never grew tired of it. I’m not sure I could do the same show every day. But he never grew bored with it. So maybe that’s why it was so successful: because he was always ready and happy to do it.”
Barker also expressed his feelings on Good Morning America in 2007.
“I am not ready to say goodbye to it. So, I think it’s a good time to say goodbye because I want to leave them wanting more.”
Some golden memories from the show Price is Right, Vanna White competing before she reached Wheel of Fortune fame, to women contestants losing their tops after jumping up and down in excitement.
But one admirable thing was that the show gave a planned action to Barker to bring awareness to the welfare of animals.
Barker is also known as a lawyer of animal rights and his show-ending catchphrase, “This is Bob Barker reminding you to help control the pet population. Have your pets spayed or neutered.”
He also told us that his wife Gideon gave him the motivation to activism for animals.
“She was ahead of her time,” Barker told Good Morning America. “She stopped wearing fur coats before anyone stopped. She became a vegetarian before people were becoming vegetarians. And I gradually did the same thing with her.”
Through his DJ&T Foundation, he spent millions to successfully establish animal-rights curricula at law schools, including Harvard, Columbia, and Northwestern.
“If young people are introduced to the terrible exploitation and mistreatment of animals in society, it will help influence them in anything they do,” Barker told the Associated Press in 2015. “When your education and encouragement fail, you have to have legislation.”
In his almost 100 years of life, he is an incredible personality. He is no doubt a lovely person who used his celebrity status for the well-being of innocent animals.