Planning a cruise to enjoy prize found at Dorchester County store
A U.S. Navy veteran and his wife enjoyed a mid-morning celebration on Nov. 1 after he scratched his way to a $30,000 top prize on the $3 Match & Win ticket.
“Spend $3 and get $30,000 back – that’s pretty good,” said the Pasadena resident as he claimed his prize later that day at Lottery headquarters in Baltimore.
But in his kitchen that morning, it took time before the 66-year-old and his wife came to grips with their big win.
“I read the numbers and I said, ‘That can’t be right,’ ” he said. “I gave it to my wife and she looked at it and I got my phone out.”
The retiree, who spent 22 years in the Navy, used the ticket checker on the Maryland Lottery’s My Lottery Rewards app to scan the scratch-off’s barcode with his mobile phone.
“I scanned it and it said, ‘You’re a $30,000 winner,’ ” he said. “And I didn’t believe it! I scanned it again. And then, I cleared everything out of the phone and scanned it a third time. And then, I finally believed it. I was shaking and excited. That’s a lot of money.”
Indeed, the $30,000 prize is much more than he has ever won on a Lottery scratch-off. His largest prize before this one was $25.
The lucky winner said he and his wife plan to use some of the money to buy wood for their wood-burning stove this winter. He added that they haven’t taken a vacation in 10 years and are thinking about going on a cruise to the Caribbean in 2017.
“Somewhere warm, where I can put my feet in the sand for a few days,” he said with a smile.
The Anne Arundel County resident found his Lottery luck at Hurlock Food Rite located at 101 Broad Street in Hurlock. The Dorchester County retailer is a winner as well. For selling the top-prize-winning ticket, the store will receive a $300 bonus from the Lottery – equal to 1 percent of the prize value.
The Match & Win ticket launched in August, and this was the first of its $30,000 top prizes claimed. Three more remain, along with 18 $1,000 prizes and thousands of additional prizes ranging from $3 to $500.