Top 5 Lottery Winners from Canada
Hitting winning numbers on a lottery ticket is the ultimate dream for every lover of games of chance. Sometimes, the universe sends you a sign to just buy a lottery ticket and check your ticket number whether you have won!
What would you do if you just saw your numbers as the winning lottery numbers on the TV?
I would surely jump with joy, running around and waving my ticket number in front of my closest ones. And of course – I would buy my family and friends something nice with the money from the current jackpot.
Nowadays, you can often read lottery winner stories online where winners of prize-winning games buy cars and other lavish lifestyle-themed possessions. Some of these people make odd decisions in life and go broke despite having millions in their bank account after winning the lottery.
While you plan which would be the winning combination to win the lottery, let’s look at some of Canada’s most memorable lottery-winner stories.
Canadian Lottery Winners
Adlin Lewis – $70 Million
Adlin Lewis is the name of the biggest lottery winner in Canada. The news broke out on the 7 January 2020 draw when Mr. Lewis won 70 million dollars, and it went on to become some of the best lottery-winner stories. He chose to play his favourite Canadian lotto game – Lotto Max.
Lewis works as a credit risk manager and has a lucky man history. So far, he has won a car and a couple of work-related accolades. But the $70 million dollars is a money fortune itself that he won’t need to work a day more or play another Lotto Max ticket.
Imagine winning the lottery and enjoying yourself with your wife, relaxing in a great house near Florida beaches? They might not buy happiness, but money sure makes life easier though.
This story shouts out New York, here I come.
Zhe Wang – $64 Million
Five years before the biggest lottery win in Canada, Zhe Wang won $64 million dollars on a single ticket in a Lotto 6/49 draw in October 2015 and instantly became one of the biggest lottery winners in Canada’s history. She bought the winning ticket at Petro Canada petrol station. Remember this event the next time you buy gas.
$63.4 Million in 2013
In a 63.4 million dollar draw in April 2013, a mustached senior citizen named Harry Black claimed a 31.7 million dollar jackpot on Lotto 6/49. At the time, Mr. Black said that he has a tradition stretching over 35 years to play the same numbers with a habit of buying a pair of tickets with identical numbers and hopefully winning the lottery.
What could be the odds, right? After the draw, he stayed home and didn’t claim his money for a month because of the stress. However, he showed up to cash his winnings a month later and didn’t plan to quit his job after hitting the jackpot. Mr. Black became one of the legendary lottery winners as part of the lottery winner stories across the world.
$60 Million in 2015
Two years later, in 2015, a group of 12 people from an address in Markham, Ontario, got lucky and shared the joy of becoming lottery winners. They bought a ticket in Brampton, Ontario.
One of the colleagues went out for lunch to buy some burritos and in the meantime, he checked the ticket on the lotto website and couldn’t believe his eyes. Take notes – getting a burrito and a lottery ticket is a great combination.
Dennis Cartier, the colleague who checked the winning ticket, decided not to tell his coworkers the big headline until Monday.
He started off by announcing that he is tired of the lotto and doesn’t want to continue, and that is one more thing left: they won the $60 million PowerBall event. They split the whole amount of money into equal pieces of 5 million dollars for each colleague! Imagine going to your house with 5 million dollars. Just wow – lottery winner stories at their best!
$55 Million in 2015
This story is another great colleagues’-playing-the-lottery story. And ending up with all the winnings.
A group of 20 colleagues won $55 million dollars on the Friday Lotto Max in Canada. As you have probably guessed, when the first of the winners found out about the prize, there was an instant screamer at the local gas station.
One of the winners, Claudine Forget describes that one of her colleagues wrote her a chat message saying “call me, it’s urgent” and “sit down, it’s important,” which she thought was an indicator that something bad had happened. However, Claudine could not even imagine that a sum of 55 million dollars was the news details of the day.
Each of the colleagues shared a $2.75 million tax-free prize, and some of them chose to retire from the company since the odds were in their favour.
Lotto seems to be the best team-building event on the market, right?
Does winning the lottery ruin your life?
Throughout life, here and there, you will hear or read lottery winner stories without happy endings. Stories about spoiled rich people, or dream come true stories about a big payday when someone is winning the lottery, but later on, does all the wrong things and spends instinctively only to end up losing all their money.
An unexpected windfall alters your life forever, but in the end, you are solely in charge of how you are going to react to that kind of news.
We cannot conclude whether the lottery ruins a person’s life or alters it for the better, but let’s discuss some examples of how lottery wins, or money changes people’s lives. Here is a story about a person whose life was seriously changed after winning the lottery.
Gerald Muswagon
Lottery-winner stories can be pretty dark. In 1998, Gerald Muswagon from Canada made a 180-degree change in his financial status by winning the lottery. He bought a $2 Super 7 ticket and ended up cashing in a $10 million dollar jackpot.
However, instead of changing his life for the better, in only 7 years, Gerald made all the wrong decisions. His cousins said at the time that he did not surround himself with the right people to guide him. This guy lost everything. That is why all lotto and casino websites have responsible gambling sections. Some people just cannot handle playing games of chance and winning.
A media report highlighted: “He bought several new vehicles for himself and friends, purchased a house that turned into a nightly “party pad” and often celebrated his new lifestyle with copious amounts of drugs and alcohol. In a single day, he bought eight big-screen televisions for friends.”
Unfortunately for Mr. Muswagon, he continued this behaviour, including illegal activity, which ended in 2005 when he was found hanged in his parents’ garage.
The other side of the ticket
On the contrary to Mr. Muswagon’s life story, a study by Vietnamese researchers found out that if you win money on the lottery, you are more likely to get a larger social circle.
According to this study, with around $5,000 you can “purchase” a new friend.
As the Daily Mail writes, “An expert from Vietnam National University studied the impact of lottery winnings on the social circles of 5,000 people across five Vietnamese cities and provinces. After receiving such a so-called ‘income shock’, he found that people tended to acquire more long-term friends and those made outside of work settings.”
This expert argues that if you win money on the lottery, you can increase your participation in social activities, allowing people to make new long-term friends.
After all, you can’t say that the lottery ruins someone’s life, as it pretty much comes down to a person’s character and how they will channel a life-changing event to his daily habits, family, or friends.
You are the only person in charge deciding whether you are going to spend your money wisely, maybe spend it on some renovations around the home, maybe spend it to settle some debt, or throw it all away.
Our advice is not to take lottery and lottery winner stories so seriously. Use it as a socializing activity with your family and friends. And maybe, just maybe, you will cash in someday.
Where to buy and how much does a lottery ticket cost?
Your next lottery win might be just right around the corner.
Today, you can buy a lottery ticket in a couple of minutes if you buy it online or at the nearest convenience store, gas station, supermarket, or mall. You can use a mobile app to purchase and check results, so enable the location services on your phone and buy a lotto ticket today.
If you are an online player, you can find numerous online gaming sites to buy a lottery ticket. You have to make sure that the site you are buying from is reliable. Also, responsible gambling is a must so do not get carried away with purchasing lots of tickets.
Usually, lottery tickets are cheap. You can buy them for a couple of dollars and get a shot at millions of dollar prizes. Choose your winning numbers or let the mobile app choose them for you – it is very easy to play!
It mostly depends on the rules for the type of lotto game you are playing, or if you would like to include some options, then the ticket may cost a couple of bucks more.
However, the lottery is pretty much a cost-effective game that can bring you a bank.
Tips to win the lottery
If you thought that winning the lottery doesn’t require specific skills, you are not far from the truth. It is after all a game based on luck, but honest advice is always welcomed, right?
However, some practical tips come from past lottery winner stories that have hit a million jackpot at some point.
Let’s talk about Richard Lustig.
This is an American who was winning the lottery in seven state-sponsored lottery games from 1993 to 2010. And he did well on the money too. In this run of 7 wins, Richard totalled something above 1 billion dollars before tax.
Lustig gives several tips to keep in mind when playing the lottery:
- Treat the lottery like a job. Play every week
- Stick to a budget and only buy the number of tickets you can afford
- Always play the same winning numbers
- Pick your own numbers instead of having the machine do it for you
- Research and see if your numbers have won before
- Select your ten sets of numbers and keep those if you continue buying tickets
Is the lottery considered gambling?
Lottery and casino games, bingo, sports betting, and several other games are considered gambling. However, the initial purpose of these games is to entertain rather than ruin people’s lives. They are not solely designed to constantly chase that 1 million prize.
But, a lot of these games pose a threat to raise addictiveness or gather bad habits, therefore such a problem may arise.
Let’s take a look at the lottery in terms of social engagement.
Lottery as a Way of Life
Not so long ago, when we weren’t accessing the internet everywhere, watching a live lottery show on the TV was a good enough reason to have a great and fun evening with your wife or husband, kids, and friends.
The lottery is also a loved activity by the HR department in a company. With a 5-15$ invested per item, you can offer so many exciting things on the menu that can be drawn in a lottery manner.
History books record lottery activities way back. We speak about lottery events that helped support financing major government projects such as the Wall of China or amusement activities during the Roman Empire, charity events, etc.
In the end, the lottery is much more different than the other games in store. It has more of a social value. And no one would mind a fortune based on some lucky numbers?
Conclusion – Playing Lotto is Fun, so Dream Big and Chase Your Dream!
These lottery-winner stories should inspire you to try your luck in Lotto 6/49, Lotto Max, or other lotto games of your choice. As you can see, becoming a winner is not difficult, so with a little bit of luck, your first name and address may appear on the list of multimillionaires.
We recommend you visit some reputable lotto websites, enable location services, confirm your account, and start playing. Winning big money is rare, but it happens – so always play and dream of a big prize and it just might happen someday.
