Bartender tipped with winning $50,000 lottery ticket

The ticket was bought from a lottery machine inside the Missouri bar.

October 29, 2019, 2:45 PM

One bartender received a tip worth well over 20% of the tab thanks to a customer who paid with a Powerball lottery ticket.

Taylor Russey told the Missouri Lottery that the ticket, which was worth $50,000, was given to her by a regular customer who "will buy the rest of the regulars in the bar Lottery tickets every now and then, especially when it’s high."

“And he did that on Saturday -- he bought all of us Lottery tickets,” she added.

The staff at the bar found out from the lottery terminal that a $50,000 winning ticket has been sold and Russey questioned patrons and staff.

"I was like, 'Guys, who won all this money and didn’t tell anybody?'" Russey said.

PHOTO: A man purchases a Powerball lottery ticket at a convenience store in Washington, D.C., Jan. 07, 2016.
A man purchases a Powerball lottery ticket at a convenience store in Washington, D.C., Jan. 07, 2016.
AFP via Getty Images, FILE

She scanned the ticket she had received and saw that she needed to claim her prize at a lottery office, because it was worth $50,000, according to the Missouri Lottery.

Russey’s ticket had four of the five numbers that were drawn on Oct. 19 - 14, 27, 29, 59, 65, and the Powerball was 12.

The draw ticket had originally been purchased at Bleacher’s Bar, in O’Fallon.

Her winning ticket was the 40th worth $50,000 sold in Missouri and the second sold in O’Fallon in 2019.

Related Topics