Celebrities Helping Pets
- 1. "A ""Cause"" to Celebrate (Prince)"
- 2. "How ""Shweet"" It Is! (Cartoonist Patrick McDonnell)"
- 3. More than a Game (Bob Barker)
- 4. Den Mother (Tippi Hedren)
- 5. Something to Believe In (Rikki Rockett)
- 6. One Life to Give (Catherine Hickland)
- 7. Canine Crusader Burt Ward
- 8. Casting Out the Demons (Linda Blair)
- 9. Donna Salyers Makes a Difference
More than a Game (Bob Barker)
Rebecca L. Rhoades, ASPCA
We’ve been inviting him into our homes for more than 40 years. The perfect guest, he’s always gracious, congenial and elegant. He’s won 14 Emmy Awards, including one for lifetime achievement, he’s awarded more than $200,000,000 in prizes, and he was named the most popular game show host of all time in a national poll.
Now in his 30th year as the host of The Price is Right, television’s longest-running game show, Bob Barker has become more than just a game show host—he’s a daytime television institution. Underneath his smiling exterior, though, Barker is one of the most serious and dedicated animal welfare activists in the entertainment industry.
Over the years, he’s worked on behalf of animals such as chimpanzees, elephants and wolves, as well as cats and dogs. He’s spoken out against animal abuse in the entertainment industry, protested against fur farms and lobbied Congress on behalf of circus animals. And for the past 20 years, he’s ended every Price is Right show with a message urging people to spay and neuter their pets.
Man of Action
Barker’s love of animals stretches back to his early childhood. Born in Darrington, WA, he grew up on the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota, where he and his mother, Matilda, a teacher, lived in the town’s hotel. “It was the only two-story building in town,” Barker says. “When my mother wanted me, she’d go up to the roof and look for the dogs. I always had a pack of dogs with me, and wherever the dogs were, she knew she’d find me.”
After attending Drury College in Springfield, MO, on a basketball scholarship and serving a stint during World War II as a U.S. Navy fighter pilot, Barker and his wife, Dorothy Jo, eventually moved to Los Angeles, where in 1956 he became the host of Truth or Consequences, a job he held for 18 years.
During this time, Barker contributed financially to a variety of animal charities, but it wasn’t until 1975, when he was asked to serve as chairman of Be Kind to Animals Week in Los Angeles, that he became aware of the extent of animal exploitation.
“As I became more involved, I began to be aware—far beyond anything I had known before—of the terrible exploitation of animals,” says Barker. “I just felt compelled to do what I could to rectify the situation, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.”
A man who lives by his convictions, Barker’s been a vegetarian for more than 20 years, a choice he made out of concern for animals. He also no longer wears any leather products.
In 1987, he made headlines for his views against fur. As host of both the Miss U.S.A. and Miss Universe pageants, Barker had been urging the show’s organizers to stop awarding fur coats as prizes. The executives of the Miss U.S.A. pageant agreed that they would stop giving away furs in 1988, but when Barker arrived in Albuquerque, NM, to host the show, he was shocked to learn that the contestants would be making their swimsuit competition entrances wearing fur coats. During negotiations with the show’s producer, during which time Barker said he could not possibly be on the stage surrounded by women wearing fur after speaking out on the inhumane cruelty of fur production, the story was leaked to the media, and the “Fur Flap” became front-page news across the country.
“If [the anti-fur movement] had set out to accomplish this, if we’d tried to get this type of publicity, we would never have done it,” says Barker. “It was the best thing that ever happened to the anti-fur campaign.”
Barker persuaded the producers to use synthetic furs, but the following year they reneged on their agreement. Amidst much publicity, Barker resigned. He did, however, persuade the producers of The Price is Right to eliminate furs as prizes, as well as leather products and safari vacations.
Barker made headlines again when, while working with Los Angeles-based United Activists for Animal Rights (UAAR), he helped expose animal cruelty on the set of the 1987 movie Project X. Barker’s work resulted in an investigation by the Los Angeles Department of Animal Regulation, which recommended that charges be filed against some of the animal trainers.
“Bob has been willing to step up and actually get things done,” says UAAR founder Nancy Burnet. “I don’t know of another personality who’s been willing to do that to the extent that he has.”
Since Project X, Barker and Burnet have teamed up many times to expose abuse in the entertainment industry. Recently they were instrumental in exposing cruelty to the horses on Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman. Their investigation resulted in the termination of one of the animal trainers. And in 2000, Barker and Burnet rescued chickens from the set of TV’s reality show Big Brother, moving them to a sanctuary outside of Riverside, CA.
“He’s done more for animals than most people in the world,” says Price is Right announcer Rod Roddy. “He puts his money where his mouth is.”
Barker’s concern for animals in entertainment doesn’t just include those in movies or television. In 2000, he again joined forces with UAAR, as well as with Galt, CA-based Performing Animal Welfare Society and several other celebrities to lobby Congress for bill H.R. 2929, The Captive Elephant Accident Prevention Act.
Creating a Legacy
These days, the most important thing in Barker’s life is the DJ & T Foundation*, which he founded in 1994. Named for both his wife and his mother, who was known as Tillie, the foundation awards grants to low-cost or free spay/neuter clinics or organizations that subsidize such programs. Barker funds the DJ & T Foundation with his own money, and he doesn’t solicit any donations from the public.
“I realized that many organizations that were doing what they could with low-cost or free clinics were under-funded and needed help,” Barker says. “So I established this foundation with my own funds. I’m adding to it during my lifetime, and at the time of death, most of what I have will go into it. We’re only using the interest, so it’s something that will go on for years and years after I’m gone.”
And thanks to Pearson Television, producer and owner of The Price is Right, Barker’s fight for the rights of animals will also continue for many years. In honor of Barker’s 30 years as the show’s host, Pearson recently donated $500,000 to Harvard Law School to establish the Bob Barker Endowment for the Study of Animal Rights, which will support teaching and research in the field of animal rights law.
Today, Barker shares his home with a cat named Dulce (Spanish for “sweet”) and a Labrador named Winston, who was saved by a friend.
And in keeping with his longstanding sign-off on The Price is Right, Dulce is spayed and Winston is neutered.
* If you're a member of or know of a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization dedicated to low-cost spaying and neutering, you can contact the DJ & T Foundation for a grant application at 9201 Wilshire Blvd., Suite 204, Beverly Hills, CA 90210; tel. (310) 278-1100, or visit www.djtfoundation.org.
© 2001
ASPCA Animal Watch - Fall 2001
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