Franklin Smith of Griffin has a few new reasons to consider himself lucky. Smith recently won an impressive $25,000 prize playing the Mighty Jumbo Bucks scratcher. Chevron Foodmart, 3200 High Falls Road in Griffin, sold the ticket. Smith, 33, said that he had stopped to grab a bottle of water when he decided to purchase two Mighty Jumbo Bucks tickets.
“I had a feeling,” he said. “Something told me to get two.”
After he scratched the second ticket and realized that he had won, Smith said that he was elated.
“I was overjoyed with happiness,” he said. “I couldn’t believe it.”
Smith, a heating and air specialist and father of five, said that he plans to put his winnings into a savings account. The lucky winner claimed his prize last week at the Georgia Lottery Macon District Office. Mighty Jumbo Bucks offers players a chance to win $4 million.
Since its first year, the Georgia Lottery Corp. has returned more than $18.1 billion to the state of Georgia for education. All Georgia Lottery profits go to pay for specific educational programs, including Georgia’s HOPE Scholarship Program and Georgia’s Pre-K Program. More than 1.7 million students have received HOPE, and more than 1.4 million 4-year-olds have attended the statewide, voluntary prekindergarten program.