Bob Barker, best known for being the longtime host of “The Price is Right,” walked on at his Hollywood Woods home on Saturday of natural causes. Barker was less known for his Native American roots. Barker was 99.

“It is with profound sadness that we announce that the World’s Greatest MC who ever lived, Bob Barker has left us,” publicist Roger Neal said in a statement Saturday.
He was born Robert Willam Barker in 1923 in Darrington, Washington. His father, Byron John Barker, was one-quarter Sioux, which made him one-eighth. His father was an electrical line foreman, who passed away from injuries sustained in a fall from an electrical tower in 1929.
After his father’s death, Barker’s mother moved the family to the Rosebud Indian Reservation where she taught school. The family lived there until Barker’s early teens.
“I always bragged about being part Indian because they are a people to be proud of. And the Sioux were the greatest warriors of them all,” Barker told the Associated Press in 1962 in an interview.
Barker’s show business career on the radio for a station in Florida. In 1956, he began to host Truth or Consequences until the program ended in 1974.
Barker had already begun hosting “The Price is Right" in 1972 and remained the host until 2007. He announced his retirement on October 31, 2006 and his final episode aired on June 15, 2007.
“The Price is Right” is television’s longest running game show.
More Stories Like This
Eighth Generation Blanket Featured on Cover of British Vogue in OctoberHere’s What's Going On in Indian Country, September 21 —September 28
The Land That Carries Our Ancestors: Contemporary Art by Native Americans Exhibition Begins Sept. 22 at National Gallery of Art
Gifted Native American Flutist Robert Tree Cody Walks On
The Future is Now at Newly Opened Center for Native Futures in Chicago
Native News is free to read.
We hope you enjoyed the story you've just read. For the past dozen years, we’ve covered the most important news stories that are usually overlooked by other media. From the protests at Standing Rock and the rise of the American Indian Movement (AIM), to the ongoing epidemic of Murdered and Missing Indigenous People (MMIP) and the past-due reckoning related to assimilation, cultural genocide and Indian Boarding Schools.
Our news is free for everyone to read, but it is not free to produce. That’s why we’re asking you to make a donation to help support our efforts. Any contribution — big or small — helps. Most readers donate between $10 and $25 to help us cover the costs of salaries, travel and maintaining our digital platforms. If you’re in a position to do so, we ask you to consider making a recurring donation of $12 per month to join the Founder's Circle. All donations help us remain a force for change in Indian Country and tell the stories that are so often ignored, erased or overlooked.
Donate to Native News Online today and support independent Indigenous journalism. Thank you.