Nancy Burnet: 4 Facts About Bob Barker's Decades-Long Girlfriend

Before his death, Bob Barker, the famous host of the CBS television game show "The Price is Right," enjoyed a blissful relationship with his longtime girlfriend Nancy Burnet. On August 26, 2023, Barker died of natural causes at age 99. "It is with profound sadness that we announce that the World's Greatest MC who ever lived, Bob Barker, has left us," Barker's publicist Roger Neal announced in a statement to the outlet. Unsurprisingly, Barker's death was followed by tributes from friends and loved ones, including his girlfriend, who praised the television host for his work ethic. "He had such an amazing, productive life. He was a natural, but he worked hard. Everything he accomplished, he accomplished himself because of hard work," Burnet said in an interview with People.

Burnet, whose romance with the famed television host spanned four decades, also touched on her connection with Barker and the secret to their long-lasting love. "I think the thing that he liked most about me is that I may have been the only person who treated him like anyone else," she explained. "I did not baby him or fawn over him, or you know how people are with celebrities. I was never like that. He was a person. I was very honest and direct with him."

Although their love story is no hidden tale, much of Nancy Burnet's life remains unknown to many. Here are a few facts about her!

While Bob Barker spent most of his life in front of cameras, Nancy Burnet has spent much of her life behind the scenes fighting animal cruelty. In 1987, Burnet founded the United Activists for Animal Rights group and soon assumed the role of president at the foundation. Additionally, Burnet worked as director and vice president of the DJ&T Foundation, the non-profit Barker founded in 1994. 

Per the Society for Non-profits, the name DJ&T was inspired by Barker's late wife Dorothy Jo, who died in 1981, as well as his mother Matilda, also known as Tilly. The foundation was started to solve animal overpopulation through the funding of low-cost spay/neuter clinics and voucher programs. "There are just too many cats and dogs being born," Barker explained to The New York Times in 2004. "Animals are being euthanized by the millions simply because there are not enough homes for them. In the United States, there is a dog or cat euthanized every 6.5 seconds." Despite this, the DJ&T Foundation reportedly is not involved in financing the neutering of sheltered dogs or cats.

When he was not hosting "The Price is Right," Bob Barker worked alongside Nancy Burnet to advocate for animal rights. Of course, this comes as no surprise, given the pair's shared passion for activism brought them together in the first place. Burnet and Barker met at an animal adoption event in March 1983 and soon hit it off. Though Burnet reportedly did not know much about Barker, she soon discovered he could be helpful for a project she was working on. "I knew almost nothing about him really. I knew he did 'The Price Is Right.' I knew that he was interested in animals, and he had the format to get the word out," she told People in an August 2023 interview. 

In their many years together, Burnet and Barker worked on several important projects, which sometimes involved staging protests during international trips. Speaking to Fox News in December 2022, Burnet recounted a trip to Hawaii during which they intervened in saving an injured pit bull. "We found out that it wasn't dog fighting at all. It was because of hunting pigs with pits," Burnet explained. "And so we tried to get a campaign going for that, and they were happy to see us leave there. We weren't welcome in a lot of places."

In a statement released following Bob Barker's death, Nancy Burnet shared how proud she was of their joint advocacy for animal rights over the years. "I am so proud of the trailblazing work Barker, and I did together to expose the cruelty to animals in the entertainment industry and including working to improve the plight of abused and exploited animals in the United States and internationally. We were great friends over these 40 yrs. He will be missed," she said in a statement obtained by People following Barker's death.

In 2018, Barker donated over 400 acres in Moreno Valley, California, to DonkeyLand, a nonprofit rescue organization that works with injured and sick wild donkeys and burros. This land helped fence off part of the property so the animals could be protected and still roam freely. Burnet called the donation Barker's "greatest living legacy," and in total, he has donated millions of dollars to DonkeyLand through his charitable organizations.

"That was a disaster," she told Fox News. "Donkeys were being hit by cars, trains, it was a hideous situation." Additionally, Chad Cheatham, vice president of Donkeyland, told NBC Los Angeles, "Five hundred acres that's fenced and that's thanks to Bob Barker and Nancy Burnet and the foundation for the generous contributions for the sanctuary and the fencing."

Following the death of Bob Barker's wife Dorothy Jo Gideon in 1981, the famed television host swore never to remarry. "She was with me all the time until she died. For some men, maybe a second or third marriage would work out fine. In my case, I had my marriage and she was the love of my life," Barker told Esquire in a 2007 interview. And true to his words, Barker never married again. However, that doesn't mean he never considered it.

During her 2023 People interview, Burnet revealed that Barker proposed to her several times during their relationship. "Neither of us had any desire ever to be married again, and he believed it when we first started seeing each other. But as the years went by, he proposed to me many times. I just said, 'I just don't want to be married.' Our humor was very dry. We kidded in a way. And he said, 'Not even to me?' And I said, 'Especially not to you." But while Burnet said she was bothered about the couple's 20-year age difference, she admits Barker was indifferent. "He was interested in doing it anyway. He didn't care," she explained to the outlet.