A lottery club that “started as a joke” between teachers at a North Carolina elementary school ended up winning a $100,000 Powerball prize 15 years later.
The nine teachers at Swansboro Elementary School told North Carolina Education Lottery officials they started buying tickets together about 15 years ago.
“Fifteen years ago it just kind of started as a joke and we were walking down the hall going, ‘If we won that we could retire early,'” member Nicole Meadows said.
The teachers, who call their club “Nine Lucky Pirates,” won $100,000 from a Powerball ticket they bought for the Nov. 24 drawing from the Walmart on West Corbett Avenue in Swansboro.
The other members of the club are Leah Allen, Mary Brooks, Leah Cottle, Suellen Dixon, Lori Jones, Jill Kidd, Cynthia Paredes and Melinda Whorley.
The teachers said learning of the big win came as a shock.
“I couldn’t hardly talk,” Meadows said. “I was hyperventilating.”
“She is like, ‘We won!,’ and I am like, ‘What?,’ and Leah goes, ‘She is for real; we won, we won,'” Dixon said.
The teachers each claimed $11,110 and, after required federal and state tax withholdings, each took home $7,972.
