A Glasgow, Kentucky, truck driver turned a quick energy drink errand into a life-changing payday after a $20 lottery ticket landed him a $551,151 jackpot — and his wife needed to see it to believe it.
James Milby and his wife, Tammy, were working in their yard on the morning of the win when he decided to make a run to South Green Market on South Green Street in Glasgow for a drink. With $30 in change in his pocket, Mr. Milby purchased a $20 Big Money Doubler Fast Play ticket, a game he only discovered a few months earlier at the suggestion of his grandson.
“My grandson was watching me and he told me, ’Papaw, it’s just like a scratch-off, only you don’t scratch!’” Mr. Milby told lottery officials. “So, I started trying them instead of scratch-offs. I’d been watching that game and figured it was bound to be hit some time or another.”
When he scanned the ticket at the store, the result stopped him cold.
“I scanned it and thought, ’What in the world, something ain’t right,’” he said. “I hollered for my buddy who works at the store, and he said, ’I knew it! Your time was coming!’”
Mr. Milby rushed home to share the news, but his reaction left Tammy convinced something had gone wrong, not right.
“He was just a shaking,” she told lottery officials. “Then he kept saying, ’No, it’s good! It’s good!’”
She wasn’t taking his word for it. “I made him take me back to the store,” Tammy said. “I’ve got to see it for myself.”
“I dinged it up on the machine and took a picture,” Mr. Milby said. “I knew she’d never believe me!”
The $551,151 prize included the advertised jackpot of $301,151 plus a rare $250,000 bonus feature — making it only the second time a Kentucky Lottery player has claimed that additional bonus on a Fast Play game. According to the Kentucky Lottery, the odds of winning the jackpot along with the bonus on the $20 Big Money Doubler ticket are 1 in 240,000.
After taxes, the couple took home $399,584.47. They kept the win quiet at first, even dodging questions from their children who noticed their parents’ unusual schedules. Their plan after claiming the prize: invest, pay off bills, and slow down.
“I’m a family man,” Mr. Milby said. “I just want to improve my family’s life. And whatever the good Lord puts on my heart to do, I’ll do.”
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