Bob Barker, courtly host of ‘The Price Is Right,’ dies at 99

Bob Barker, the silver-haired TV personality who spent 35 years presiding with courtly reserve over the showcase of American consumerism known as The Price Is Right, the longest-running game show in US television history, has died. He was 99.

Barker’s death was confirmed by his longtime publicist, NBC News reported Saturday. 

A television fixture for three generations of Americans, Barker hosted Truth or Consequences for 19 years, beginning in 1956, and emceed Miss Universe and Miss USA beauty pageants from 1967 to 1987.

But his defining role was as ringmaster for 6,586 episodes of CBS’s The Price Is Right, which tests whether wildly enthusiastic contestants - called at random from the live studio audience by the famous words, "Come on down!” - can guess the retail prices of items ranging from household cleansers to luxury automobiles. 

Barker estimated that during his run, from 1972 until his retirement in 2007, contestants won more than $300 million in prizes in the show’s various games, which carried names like Plinko and Punch-a-Bunch.

Plucking regular people from a diverse audience to estimate the value of a blender or sofa set gave the hour-long show its broad appeal and staying power, Barker said in a 2000 oral-history interview with the Television Academy Foundation. 

"It is a people-oriented show beyond anything else on the air,” he said, adding, "You’ll see one fellow there in a three-piece suit, you’ll see the next one in sandals and shorts. It looks different and it feels different and it is different. I think television viewers like to see people just like they are up there on the stage doing this stuff.”

About 8.7 million viewers watched a special prime-time encore of Barker’s farewell show on June 15, 2007. Actor Drew Carey was picked to succeed Barker as host when the show entered its 36th season.

Still on the air, the show celebrated the start of its 50th season in September 2021.