Bob Barker’s father Byron John Barker, who had Sioux ancestry, worked as a power line foreman. The nature of his job meant that the Barker family, including Bob’s mother Matilda “Tilly” Kent Tarleton Barker, moved across different states.
One fateful night in Washington changed the course of life as a young Bob and his mother knew it. “There was a problem on a tower, and my father, his men had all gone home, and he wanted to get it straightened out immediately,” Bob narrated in a chat with UCLA. Each worker, including his father, had their own set of hooks. Byron wore hooks that weren’t his size, a miscalculation that turned out catastrophic. He ended up suffering a fall that inflicted injury on his hip. His health deteriorated afterward.
“It bothered him for the rest of his life and eventually led to his death, according to the doctors,” Bob divulged, “Nature just formed a hip joint, and he had a limp after that, and eventually it rubbed on his spine and caused his death when he was only forty-one years old.”
