Do you recall the famous answer to Bob Eubanks’ question on The Newlywed Game: “Where is the weirdest place that you had the urge to make whoopee?” Do you know what other shows Bob Barker hosted before The Price is Right? Which game show host was simultaneously anchor of ABC’s nightly newscast? And just how did Allen Ludden end up marrying Betty White?

We love pop culture here at the New River Voice, so when we heard about a Southwest Virginia author who had a book about game show hosts, we had to give it a read. David Baber, who is a librarian at Emory & Henry College in Emory, Va., and lives in Bristol, Va., has had a life-long fascination with game shows and their hosts. He stated that he began watching game shows at the age of 3 and vividly recalls watching them with his grandmother, to whom the book is dedicated.

In his book, Baber provides biographies for 32 game show hosts, many of them known for hosting more than one show. The names include some still well-known today, such as Alex Trebek, Pat Sajack, Dick Clark, and Regis Philbin. Some will still be easily recognized by those of us in middle age, former hosts such as Bert Convy, Richard Dawson, Monty Hall, Wink Martindale, and Gene Rayburn, for instance. And still others are from the early days of TV game shows, guys such as Bud Collyer, Hal March, Garry Moore, and Bert Parks.

The book painstakingly details an array of facts and anecdotes from each of those personalities in others over the course of nearly 300 pages. And through those details we get both a look at the individual hosts and their personal lives as well as events that shaped the history of game shows.

For instance, quiz shows had just settled in as a game-show subgenre and were enjoying enormous popularity in the 1950s when scandal rocked the industry. Through the biographies of the aforementioned March along with hosts such as Jack Nartz and Jack Barry, Baber discusses the quiz show scandal, where contestants were given assistance by producers to rig the outcomes.

We also hear the good, bad, and ugly of the personal lives of the hosts. One of the ugliest was that of Ray Combs, known by most as a warm, generous guy—a Mormon who found himself warming up the audiences for shows such as Diff’rent Strokes and The Facts of Life before succeeding Richard Dawson on Family Feud. His life after Family Feud was chaotic and tragic, including a severe car accident, marital and financial problems, and a final meltdown that ended in his death. Baber nicely tells the facts of Combs’ struggles without judgment or editorial commentary.

Baber has stated a particular admiration for Bill Cullen, and he certainly gives Cullen his due on the book, discussing Cullen’s 49-year broadcasting career that saw him hosting, announcing, or guest starring in 25,000 individual radio and television episodes.

Overall, Baber used extensive research along with personal interviews with some of the hosts and/or his family or friends to compile the book. Each entry begins with a personal profile that details the basics such as full name, birth date, family information, and a career history. Then the bios expand into a more narrative format divided with lots of subheads, which make the book easy to skim if you’re not that interested in a particular host.

The only two negatives regarding the book have nothing to do with Baber. One is the formatting of the personal information for each host. For guys who have a long TV career, reading the extensive list of shows, dates, and other information gets tedious in one huge paragraph format. In addition, the list price of $55 will prevent many luke-warm fans of game shows away from the book, leaving only the true die-hards who would shell out that kind of money. The book would, however, be useful in academic settings covering the media, television, and pop culture.

The book is published by McFarland. It is available nationwide. If local bookstores such as Coffee Buy the Book (Pulaski), Easy Chair (Blacksburg), and noteBooks (Floyd) don’t have the book in stock, they should be able to easily order the book for you.

Tim W. Jackson used to love to watch game shows when on summer breaks as a kid. Card Sharks, Match Game, and Joker’s Wild were among his favorites.