ST. LOUIS — A bartender in O’Fallon, Missouri recently received a tip that changed her life.
Taylor Russey received a Powerball ticket from a customer. She said it was not unusual for this particular customer to gift the tickets to others as tips.
“One of the regulars will buy the rest of the regulars in the bar lottery tickets every now and then, especially when it’s high,” Russey said. “And he did that on Saturday – he bought all of us lottery tickets.”
The next day, the bar’s lottery terminal told staff that they had sold a $50,000 winner for the previous night’s drawing.
“I was like, ‘Guys, who won all this money and didn’t tell anybody?’” Russey recalled.
She then scanned her ticket at the terminal and was informed that she must claim her prize at a lottery office because her ticket was the one worth $50,000.
Her ticket’s numbers matched four of the five white-ball numbers drawn on Oct. 19, plus the Powerball. The winning numbers for the drawing were 14, 27, 29, 59, 65, and the Powerball was 12. The ticket was purchased at Bleacher’s Bar, 454 Highway P, in O’Fallon.
Russey’s ticket is the 40th $50,000 winner sold in Missouri and the second sold in O’Fallon in 2019.
