Schoolteacher claims $1 million jackpot
Published: October 12, 2005
by Robert Struckman — A wire transfer Tuesday from Montana Lottery ended the paycheck-to-paycheck existence of Daniel and Brittnie Burke Keilman.
The 26-year-old couple won $1 million when a Powerball drawing Saturday night matched five pairs of numbers on a $1 ticket bought at Orange Street Food Farm the first week in October.
When Brittnie bought the ticket, along with milk and other assorted everyday groceries, she also purchased the $1 Power Play. That can multiply a ticket’s winnings from two to five times. And it did, transforming a $200,000 ticket into a $1 million whopper.
”I’m totally flabbergasted,“ Brittnie said with a giddy laugh. She was talking by cell phone from Drummond. The couple was en route to Missoula from the Montana Lottery office in Helena.
The plan was to get back to Missoula early enough for Dan’s 6 p.m. on-call shift at Missoula Emergency Services, where he is an EMT. He also works at St. Patrick Hospital in the dialysis unit. Brittnie teaches seventh-grade language arts and physical education at Washington Middle School.
Both graduated from Helena High School and the University of Montana.
When Brittnie bought her first lottery ticket in July, she jokingly told her mother that she intended to win.
But the laugh only went so far. When the couple, who recently celebrated their fourth wedding anniversary, shopped for a new Ford Ranger in August, they balked at the payments.
”It would have been too much of a squeeze,“ Brittnie said.
That’s because, like many young Missoula couples, finances for Brittnie and Dan were tight. Brittnie’s father advised her to put her dollars into an investment fund rather than lottery tickets, said Jo Berg, a spokeswoman at Montana Lottery. Berg met the Keilman couple and their parents this morning at the state Lottery office.
The drawing that yielded the winning numbers happened Saturday night, but Brittnie mistakenly thought she had already checked the ticket and found it a loser.
All day, the couple worked on their Missoula house. The ticket sat on a table in the front room next to the computer. That night, while Dan was brushing his teeth before bed, a friend called Brittnie saying a winning ticket had been bought at the Food Farm. Would Brittnie check hers?
”I looked online and matched the numbers. I couldn’t speak for a minute. I was jabbering, nonsensical. I started screaming,“ she said.
Dan came running from the bathroom, worried.
”I totally won a million dollars,“ she said. ”We checked it about 250 times.“
Then the two got back onto the Lottery’s Web site to find out what to do. Brittnie immediately signed the back and then made photocopies on a home printer. Then they locked the ticket in a fireproof safe.
On Monday, the couple drove to East Helena to stay at Dan’s parent’s home. They celebrated that night with a $180 bottle of Cristal champagne from a tony wine store in Helena.
At about 9:30 a.m. Tuesday, Brittnie and Dan walked into the Lottery office with both sets of parents. Soon, the money had been transferred to the couple’s bank account. Then the serious-looking ”security officer“ sat down with them for a short counseling session.
”We’re serious. We’re not going to Bermuda,“ Brittnie said with another of her contagious laughs.
Then the couple left the office and drove straight to a Helena branch of their bank to confirm the wire transfer.
”It’s here,“ Brittnie said.
At their Missoula home, which is in the middle of an extensive paint job, Brittnie and Dan sat together at the kitchen table to talk about their plans.
Will they hire out the remainder of the paint job?
That was Brittnie’s immediate thought. But with a grin, Dan said, ”No. It’s a matter of principle, and we’ve done so much work on it already.“
The two will pay student loans, keep their jobs and not do anything drastic, although they may spring for a fancier pickup truck.
”We’re going to do some serious test-driving,“ Brittnie said.
If you enjoyed this good news Subscribe to Good News Blog
Share this
To share this simply copy and paste one of the below URL's: