LOTTERY WINDFALL
Dream home win ‘a big shock’
When Tina Daly got a call from Stampede Lotteries last week, she hung up the phone, thinking the call was a joke or a scam.
“If it was really important, they’d call me back,” said Daly.
And call back they did; it turned out that her husband, Kelvin Daly, had won the coveted dream home prize, valued at more than $900,000.
Celebrating at the reception for all the winners of various yearly prizes from Stampede Lotteries, Kelvin and Tina say they still can’t believe they won.
“It’s one of the more memorable days of our lives, we’re still on Cloud 9,” said Kelvin, holding one of his smiling kids in his arms.
“When you buy any lottery ticket, you buy it because it’s a good cause, and the hope is always there that you’ll win something but you never expect it to happen.”
Kelvin works in the oil and gas industry, and was in Yellowknife when Stampede Lotteries tried and failed to reach him.
Then they rang up his wife. She called him via FaceTime, as he didn’t have cellphone service in the area.
“I was doing some work in the office and Tina called and just said, ‘Kelvin, I don’t have time, you need to make this phone call and here’s the number,’ and she hung up, that’s it,” said Kelvin.
“They had asked me not to inform him that he’d won because they had to tell him, so it was a very difficult phone call,” Tina said while laughing.
Within minutes, she was live on the phone on local TV, being asked what it was like to win.
“It was overwhelming. I’ve never felt that before. I was screaming, I was crying, I was laughing. It was a big shock.”
Tina’s initial disbelief was shared by other winners as well, including Tammy Noel, who won the Split ’Em 50 cash prize of $739,642.50.
Noel says she first got a call from her sister, then her neighbours started pounding on her door, and then her phone started lighting up with texts.
“We were numb at first. I think I’m still in that moment, still happy, still sad, still confused, still everything. I went through every possible emotion,” said her husband, Greg MacKay.
Other winners include Shirley Bergeron (a Harley-Davidson), MaryAnn Lenz (a truck and fifth wheel), Dean Semeniuk (a truck and boat package), Cindi McKenna (a truck and off-road vehicle package), Jimmie Burke (a truck) and Sandra Beckner (a Chevrolet Corvette).