The longest-running game show in television history is The Price Is Right, a proving ground of consumer shrewdness that will serve future historians well as an artifact of capitalist ideology. As it entered its sixth decade on the air during the 1990s, the program continued to beguile millions of shut-ins, homemakers, and truant school children on a daily basis nationwide.

The venerable game show made its debut on NBC in November of 1956, with Bill Cullen as host. In its early days the program had a rigid format centered on contestants guessing the prices of various consumer items. It ran until 1965 in this incarnation, at which point it was canceled and seemed consigned to TV oblivion. But the show came back in 1972 with a new host, genial former Truth or Consequences emcee Bob Barker. He would remain with Price Is Right throughout the...