Player starts the day right with a cup of coffee, a newspaper, and some lottery tickets
By Kate Northrop
SPOKANE, Wash. — A retiree is walking away from the same retailer with two lottery wins totaling $120,000 thanks to his rinse-and-repeat routine.
Some players spontaneously buy a lottery ticket and hit it big on a whim, while others find success in faithfully sticking to a set schedule or system. One Washington man won the lottery not once, but twice, thanks to his daily routine — all at the same store.
Henry Dohler's daily grind looks something like this: enjoy a cup of coffee, read the newspaper, buy some lottery tickets, and check the previous day's tickets. He won $20,000 from a scratch off he bought at the Shadle Park Safeway grocery store on West Wellesley Avenue in Spokane in 2010 and took home an even bigger prize over a decade later.
"On Tuesday, I checked the tickets I had bought Monday, and I won a free ticket," Dohler recalled. "On Wednesday, I bought my usual tickets and got my free one too. The next day I checked them and saw I didn't win anything, but then I remembered I had the free ticket, so I made sure to check it against the numbers in the paper."
Dohler's free ticket won him the $100,000 Hit 5 jackpot for the drawing on Wed., Mar. 24. He beat the odds of 1 in 850,668 and matched all five of his numbers against the five drawn, which were 4, 16, 20, 33, and 40.
"It's like the saying goes, sometimes the best things in life are free," Dohler remarked. "I had to check the ticket three times to make sure that I won. I just couldn't believe it. I actually felt myself getting flushed like my temperature was rising... but for a good reason."
According to a press release, Dohler retired after working at Western States Equipment, where he sold Caterpillar equipment parts for 46 years. He said that if he wasn't 76, he might go out and buy his dream car, a 1963 Corvette Split-Window.
"I can dream," he told the Lottery.
Rather than purchase a vintage car, Dohler plans on using the money to take a trip to the East Coast to visit family with his wife, Gloria.
Hit 5 tickets cost $1 each with drawings taking place every day at 8:00 pm PST. Last August, the Lottery modified the game by increasing the number of drawings from three times a week to once daily, among other changes to the prize tiers and odds. The starting jackpot of $100,000 remained the same and increases $10,000-$20,000 with every roll.
The daily grind got the man his win
Should be a heck of a trip for that money - happy for him and his family.
Congrats to him!! He can know scratch off a life changing win from his bucket list
Congratulations and go get your 'Vette!
Nice increases between draws like the last sentence said....we can't get the big guys PB and MM to have increases like that anymore.
No state tax either.
Right on 'Dog! That 63 Split Window 'Vette wont cost him as much as he thinks it will. Sure, a frame off restoration would be huge bucks, but '63 Split Windows are around for less money. It all depends upon the condition of it. If he was able to get one in decent shape, but it could stand some work being done to it, then he'd probably have to pony up $45,000 to $55,000. If I was his age, and he's not that much older than me, I'd buy that 'Vette and drive it like I stole it.
He's a lot like me. I have my daily routine that includes buying my tickets. He's different because unlike me, I don't want a '63 Split Window. I'd find and buy myself a 2006/2007 convertible 'Vette. They can be bought in the twenty thousands (if in real good shape) or even less depending upon how much work it might need done to it. G5
l was so wishing this was Weshar75, then l realized he resides in Oregon. Still wishing..
So, wishing that a long time lottery post player should win is a bad thing? Your bedroom window faced a graveyard as a kid, right?