Claims $50,000 prize in Aug. 2 drawing
A Silver Spring Powerball player is turning his $50,000 prize in the Aug. 2 drawing into something he and his wife can use every day – a remodeled bathroom!
The 66-year-old finance industry worker entered the Maryland Lottery Winner’s Circle with a big smile as he claimed his prize on Aug. 11. The loyal Powerball and Mega Millions player, who “dabbles” in games of Racetrax, is happily anticipating the renovation and paying off a student loan for one of his three adult daughters.
The Montgomery County resident regularly plays sets of lucky numbers involving family birthdays plus one random set of numbers – 1, 7, 16, 63, 69 and 18. “I buy four to six to 10 drawings at a time,” he said. Then, when he goes to his favorite retailer – Hillandale Beer & Wine in Silver Spring – and asks a clerk to check his tickets to see if he had any winners.
This time, his routine took an exciting and very unexpected turn.
“I went to the retailer and gave a clerk a number of tickets I hadn’t checked for a month,” he said. Sure enough, his lucky Powerball ticket for four drawings popped up as a big winner he could only cash at Lottery headquarters in Baltimore. How big was his prize? The clerk printed out the winning numbers for several weeks of drawings and they checked winning numbers against the ticket until discovering his $50,000 win. His set of random numbers did the trick!
The lucky player was one of two Marylanders to take home a $50,000 prize in the drawing. No one hit the jackpot that day or in the drawings since and, as a result, the Wednesday, Aug. 16 jackpot has reached $430 million with a cash option of $273.4 million.
Declaring himself an “eternal optimist,” the winner is hoping to eventually return to Lottery headquarters with jackpot-winning tickets for Powerball or Mega Millions.
Players can visit his favorite retailer to see if any more Lottery luck is waiting to give them a big win. The store is located at 10117 New Hampshire Avenue in Silver Spring.