A Maryland man hit a grand slam this summer playing the state lottery: four winning tickets totaling $101,000 in prize money, The Gazette of Montgomery County reports.
Donald “Donnie” Cole III, of Brookeville, won $50,000 on June 26, another $50,000 on July 26, and then $1,000 earlier this week from two tickets.
“It was a stunning feeling,” he said of his first win, which came on a $20 Big Money Mega Play scratch-off. “I just kept looking at it, wondering if I was looking at it wrong. I put it down and came back and looked at it again, and knew that I really had won.”
And after last month’s big $20 Silver & Gold ticket? “It wasn’t nearly as much of a shock the second time,” said Cole, 52, a government contractor. “It was like, ‘Wow, I did it again.'”
He learned of his two winning $500 tickets while on the phone with the Gazette reporter.
Cole is now a mini-celebrity at the Shell gas station where he bought the tickets and at the Maryland Lottery.
“We were thrilled to see Donald again,” said Maryland Lottery Communications Director Carole Everett. “We get lots of winners, but to win two $50,000 prizes in less than a month is truly unusual.”
How will Cole spend his windfall?
He and his wife raise ferrets and fish, so he’ll donate a portion to animal rescue organizations. He also said he would “reinvest” and “buy a whole lot of stuff I don’t need.”
For instance?
“I bought a $125 door knocker in the shape of a crab, just because I could.”
