Think big yellow price tag name stickers on rows of screaming fans waiting for a chance to “come on down” to contestants’ row. One Rincon resident got to experience it first-hand as he became a contestant on The Price Is Right.

With 18 of his family members cheering him on, Dennis Shuman got to compete on his favorite game show in August, which will air for the second time Tuesday at 11 a.m.

“I just wanted to have fun,” he said. “I really wasn’t trying to get picked. I actually wanted my kids to get picked because it was their first time.

This was the second attempt to get on the Price is Right for Shuman and his wife Jill — they were in the audience over 20 years ago when Bob Barker was still hosting. While visiting his sister in Pasadena, Calif., Shuman, his family, his sister’s family and their future in-laws decided to make a day out of it, and they each wore red shirts with messages and emblems to try to be chosen for a chance at contestants’ row.

“They say you have a better chance of getting picked when you’re in a group,” he said.

Shuman’s family had bedazzled his shirt with a cancer emblem that day, to mark exactly one year since his second surgery to remove cancerous, carcinoid tumors from his lower intestine that left him with less than half of his lower intestine.

He said the producers asked what he did for a living, and he told them how much he and his wife loved their business, Shuman Fine Arts Photography, in Rincon, where they photograph children and families.

“When they call you, you know when they say ‘come on down’ on the show, it is so loud that you don’t hear that at all,” Shuman said. “They hold up cue cards with your name.”

They held up his name up second, and he said he was “freaking out.” While high-fiving the crowd and celebrating from a distance with his family, he made it out of contestant’s row without even knowing what he was bidding on—mistaking cocktail dresses for a necklace and bidding $925. He was first on stage, and host Drew Carey turned his attention to his potential prize, of course, a new car — a new Toyota Scion to be exact.

“In my defense, I didn’t know what a Scion was,” Shuman said. “Tere were at least six to eight cameras within 10 feet of me and Drew Carey standing in my face with a microphone.”   

“Overwhelming — I was overwhelmed,” he said.

Unfortunately, he overbid.

He just missed one dollar on his second spin on the big wheel, but said he had so much fun and he ended up getting a cash prize of $1,800 from CBS instead of the cocktail dresses.

“I was hoarse,” he said. “For four days, I had no voice.”

The rare form of cancer, though not curable, is treatable and Shuman said his is now under control through treatment. Shuman, a Savannah Christian Church member, said he gets emotional when he talks about it.

“I know the Lord let me live, you know, and He blessed me that day,” said Shuman.