Huge Jackpot Drives Powerball Fever Across State Lines

People around the nation drove across state lines, waited an hour or more in crowded stores and plunked down their money Wednesday in hopes of winning an estimated $175-million Powerball jackpot, the richest lottery prize in history.

“I came up for the blinding chance of never having to work again in my life,” said Mike Evans of Roy, Utah, who drove to Idaho to buy tickets for the multi-state lottery.

The longest lines were in towns near states that don’t participate in the game. New Yorkers poured into Greenwich, Conn., with one man buying 4,000 tickets for Wednesday night’s drawing.

“They’re coming in hordes and congesting the roadways. We have lines two blocks long,” said Police Sgt. John Brown, who bought one ticket for each member of his family.

The Travel Emporium, a convenience store along the Indiana Toll Road a few miles west of the Ohio state line, had lines all morning of as many as 150 people. Powerball tickets are sold in 20 states and Washington, D.C.

In the nation’s capital, a case of Powerball fever made White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry 24 minutes late in starting Wednesday’s White House briefing.

“I was staying in line at our local 7-Eleven to buy Powerball tickets,” McCurry told reporters.

McCurry didn’t reveal what he would do if he won. But, he said, “You could effectively conclude my service here at this podium would come to an abrupt end.”

Many ticket buyers spent their time in line chatting about how they would spend any winnings. Among the usual answers--houses, cars and expensive vacations--were some more charitable causes.

“I would probably build another domestic-violence shelter in the state and come up with schooling for unwanted kinds,” said Reinna Fraaken of Des Moines.

The odds of correctly picking all six numbers are 80.1 million to 1.

But Charles Strutt, executive director of the Multi-State Lottery Assn., which operates Powerball, said there was an 80% chance that at least one ticket would have all the right numbers and a 60% to 70% chance of two or more winners.