Tennessee's biggest Powerball winner keeps low profile

Apr 6, 2011, 7:08 am (30 comments)

After the Big Win

Bobbi Hubbard of South Pittsburg, Tenn., keeps busy working on community projects like trying to start a free medical clinic in Marion County. She has lived in the same house for 18 years.

On the outside, there's little to show that she hit a $25.5 million Powerball jackpot in 2005, making her the state's all-time big winner as Powerball marks its seventh anniversary in Tennessee. And, unlike some cases in other states where big lottery winners didn't handle their fast fortunes well, Hubbard and her family have had a smooth transition through reasonably prudent spending and by taking a business-like approach.

"We do take a few more vacations," she said cheerfully in a telephone interview. But not to the South of France. And there's no yacht for such travel.

Powerball has become one of the most popular lottery games in the state. The $1 tickets have accounted for more than $1 billion in sales in Tennessee, and 243 Powerball tickets worth $100,000 or more have been sold in Tennessee. Twenty-five were worth at least $1 million.

For Hubbard, now 47, "the first thing we did was get a trustee to manage the money," she recalled.

They paid off bills and their mortgage. "The rest we invested," Hubbard said.

"Now, we live off the interest. We have a certain amount each month we live on. Hopefully, it will last forever. We've tried to be careful about it."

Of course, the jackpot has allowed her family to do a little splashy splurging. But not too much.

They immediately bought a red Dodge Durango so six family members could travel 100 miles to Nashville to claim their winnings. They took home $13.8 million in a lump sum payment.

They later bought a four-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bath home a block from the beach in Panama City, Fla.

"We go there about once a month," Hubbard said.

Then, she bought a red 2009 Dodge Challenger, and husband Richie got a blue 2010 one.

Meanwhile, the Hubbards sold their auto parts store and repair shop. They had won a $25,000 bonus for owning the retail shop that sold the winning ticket.

"We have kind of retired," she said.

Richie Hubbard, though, keeps busy tinkering with vehicles. Before his ticket matched all six Powerball numbers on March 30, 2005, he'd been an auto mechanic specializing in electrical systems and transmissions.

"I still work on 'em every day. As long as they're fast. I don't want one if you can outrun it," said Richie, now 57.

Their three sons have remained well grounded despite the family fortune. One wants to become a minister and is in Israel on an exchange program. Another is a police officer in Kimball, Tenn., fulfilling a lifelong dream to work in law enforcement. The third works at an auto parts retailer with sidelines at a fitness center and renting recreation equipment.

"I think they've all got good work ethics," Richie Hubbard said.

The same low-key reaction to sudden wealth applies to another winner, 67-year-old Rowena McIntyre of Martin, Tenn.

$1 million winner

McIntyre can rattle off the date she matched all five white numbers and won $1 million in Powerball: "Nov. 21, 2009."

For her, there was no new house, no new car. Like the Hubbards, she was cautious about her bulging bankroll.

"I called an attorney the first thing," McIntyre recalled.

And she kept working as a phlebotomist, a medical worker who draws blood, for a year. However, she did save her son from bankruptcy and put a grandson through college.

"Nobody would know I hit the lottery," she said. "I don't go around flaunting it."

News story photo(Click to display full-size in gallery)

AP

Comments

CrazyHazyYay!'s avatarCrazyHazyYay!

Nice to finally hear a success story from a jackpot winner. Too many times I hear how the negatives can outweigh  the positives from a lotto jackpot. Lottery curse my anus, you just have to be smart and take the right steps. Attorney, trust fund, live off of interest, and say no to strangers if they find out about  how you won (case-by-case approach).

dpoly1's avatardpoly1

I will keep a low profile if I win the Powerball Jackpot tonite ..........................

............................... I am only 5' 5" tall  Crazy

fwlawrence's avatarfwlawrence

McIntyre has to be cautious. $1 million really isn't that much these days. That amount is nothing to flaunt. Nice to read a story where the money hasn't been blown.

sully16's avatarsully16

Great story, one smart lady, congrats to the whole family.Party

cgraphix1's avatarcgraphix1

This is my first post to LP. I have been reading your comments for about a year now and decided its time to join in on the fun.

I thought it was commical that the article is about how they keep a low profile, yet they are in the media reminding everyone that they had won a few years ago... Good job maintaining that Low Profile!

time*treat's avatartime*treat

TN lets retailers buy tickets from their own store? Blue Thinking

joshuacloak's avatarjoshuacloak

you find that odd, I don't time treat

think about it, owner or store worker,

just Buying him self a ticket lottery ticket , just like he hand you a ticket,  he just pays for it himself and keeps the ticket,

he does not control the outcome of the game in any way.    its just like he went a other store and got a ticket, just save time and hit buy key

plus retailers workers also sometimes buy their own mistaken tickets, its all very normaly and legit

Now letting store workers check your ticket for you, Now that's a Bad idea. to many theft story's,   gg for self scan scanners.

and their also the clever ones who play instant ticket games, seen a roll has had 4 losers in a roll, and then buys him self the next one, trying to play the odds agiant them self's in hes favor

 

hell i buy form tn instant ticket vending machines at my local public,kroger   just for this. sense i don't know if any dumbie came around buyed 3 to 4 tickets in a row, all lost, and then store worker, buys him self the next one or 2nd, , wins and the next 2 to 4 are losers again,         trust me the instant ticket games are not random, their always a set amount of small winners for all the losers in their, and they know it

 

thro powerball and mega millions, ha

thro their is 1 thing

what if a store owner, Had a dumb beep, hand him the winning jackpot ticket, scanned a loser in, and just pulled off the biggest screw job in history of the lottery

sense their the store owner, and the player must likly got hes tickets form that store

he goes back, Watch's hes own video  video surveillance to date the time the ticket was sold, to pass the classic lottery hq questions, and why he was at it, buyed a new ticket,  during same hours of the day , with everthing the same like before the video, over writed the person buying the ticket wityh hes new fake video edited to fit in with that tape with selling time period

 

Bam, you sir just got your self a jackpot, thanks to a dumb player

like i said, never let someone else check your tickets. 

  ever more so, if i was the store owner, and i knew i just sold a winning jackpot ticket , and i know my players  often just hand me the tickets to check to see if they won anything

i have my last nites losers on stand by, remb the numbers, see the powerball and whatever white balls, scan the loser in, and Bam, fool just given me hes winning jackpot ticket, and i got some video surveillance work to do, GG 

 

I don't trust store retailers to be fair, we already have had a taxes lottery stealed forma  man, but to be fair, if you got scamed like the above, your idiot and deserve to be robbed, jsut being honest, fools and their money are soon parted. and anyone who could pull it off and Get away with it, i be in shock

the texas lottery found out due to surveillance, he was not the owners, so he did not have access to the videos to learn the spot on date when that guy buyed hes tickets, and to replace ,edit like a pro the video to show him,    am just saying, in theory it could be done

 

now as for these winners, Ya they look smart on saving money, and to be fair, they was public the sec they won,so their low profile was gone the sec  our tennessee ceo was using them, the person who interviewed them was local tn news paper reporter doing a follow up of them, sense powerball was getting large they printed the story now.

 

thro living off the interest is smart,they didn't give to many details what it is thro their getting via investments

like how i plan on living off my dividend payments form company's i plan to buy if such a large amount of money comes, the key to create new wealth to live off of, not use your current wealth , the rich get richer, and the dumb lottery winners get poorer and poorer

DC81's avatarDC81

Quote: Originally posted by cgraphix1 on Apr 6, 2011

This is my first post to LP. I have been reading your comments for about a year now and decided its time to join in on the fun.

I thought it was commical that the article is about how they keep a low profile, yet they are in the media reminding everyone that they had won a few years ago... Good job maintaining that Low Profile!

Pretty much this.

dallascowboyfan's avatardallascowboyfan

nice story...congrats to both winners

TheOtherOne's avatarTheOtherOne

Quote: Originally posted by joshuacloak on Apr 6, 2011

you find that odd, I don't time treat

think about it, owner or store worker,

just Buying him self a ticket lottery ticket , just like he hand you a ticket,  he just pays for it himself and keeps the ticket,

he does not control the outcome of the game in any way.    its just like he went a other store and got a ticket, just save time and hit buy key

plus retailers workers also sometimes buy their own mistaken tickets, its all very normaly and legit

Now letting store workers check your ticket for you, Now that's a Bad idea. to many theft story's,   gg for self scan scanners.

and their also the clever ones who play instant ticket games, seen a roll has had 4 losers in a roll, and then buys him self the next one, trying to play the odds agiant them self's in hes favor

 

hell i buy form tn instant ticket vending machines at my local public,kroger   just for this. sense i don't know if any dumbie came around buyed 3 to 4 tickets in a row, all lost, and then store worker, buys him self the next one or 2nd, , wins and the next 2 to 4 are losers again,         trust me the instant ticket games are not random, their always a set amount of small winners for all the losers in their, and they know it

 

thro powerball and mega millions, ha

thro their is 1 thing

what if a store owner, Had a dumb beep, hand him the winning jackpot ticket, scanned a loser in, and just pulled off the biggest screw job in history of the lottery

sense their the store owner, and the player must likly got hes tickets form that store

he goes back, Watch's hes own video  video surveillance to date the time the ticket was sold, to pass the classic lottery hq questions, and why he was at it, buyed a new ticket,  during same hours of the day , with everthing the same like before the video, over writed the person buying the ticket wityh hes new fake video edited to fit in with that tape with selling time period

 

Bam, you sir just got your self a jackpot, thanks to a dumb player

like i said, never let someone else check your tickets. 

  ever more so, if i was the store owner, and i knew i just sold a winning jackpot ticket , and i know my players  often just hand me the tickets to check to see if they won anything

i have my last nites losers on stand by, remb the numbers, see the powerball and whatever white balls, scan the loser in, and Bam, fool just given me hes winning jackpot ticket, and i got some video surveillance work to do, GG 

 

I don't trust store retailers to be fair, we already have had a taxes lottery stealed forma  man, but to be fair, if you got scamed like the above, your idiot and deserve to be robbed, jsut being honest, fools and their money are soon parted. and anyone who could pull it off and Get away with it, i be in shock

the texas lottery found out due to surveillance, he was not the owners, so he did not have access to the videos to learn the spot on date when that guy buyed hes tickets, and to replace ,edit like a pro the video to show him,    am just saying, in theory it could be done

 

now as for these winners, Ya they look smart on saving money, and to be fair, they was public the sec they won,so their low profile was gone the sec  our tennessee ceo was using them, the person who interviewed them was local tn news paper reporter doing a follow up of them, sense powerball was getting large they printed the story now.

 

thro living off the interest is smart,they didn't give to many details what it is thro their getting via investments

like how i plan on living off my dividend payments form company's i plan to buy if such a large amount of money comes, the key to create new wealth to live off of, not use your current wealth , the rich get richer, and the dumb lottery winners get poorer and poorer

A lot of good points there joshua.

But I wonder if the lottery makes it to where an owner cannot edit his own tapes. I wonder if doing so would change up the date/time stamp.

Not to mention, from what I read here, TN Lottery would never investigate anyway.

But this is nice to hear of fellow Tennesseans playing it smart with their money. Hopefully this article popping up is a sign that TN will have another multi-millionare winner via Powerball or Mega Millions.

This Tennessean definitely has his tickets ready :)

nickey t's avatarnickey t

WHY ARE THE REPORTERS STILL STAWKLING HERE!!!???? ... as long as they have your name and phone, they will keep at it until you give them, at least, a phone interview [?] .. c'mon - there should be a law about bothering lottery winners .. really .. Cussing Face

TheOtherOne's avatarTheOtherOne

Quote: Originally posted by nickey t on Apr 6, 2011

WHY ARE THE REPORTERS STILL STAWKLING HERE!!!???? ... as long as they have your name and phone, they will keep at it until you give them, at least, a phone interview [?] .. c'mon - there should be a law about bothering lottery winners .. really .. Cussing Face

I guess ultimately the winners dont have to concede to an interview, but yeah it is unnerving that they continue after you. Maybe these winners were hounded enough and worked a deal to say "ok, if I interview you, will you go away?"

And nickey t, you may want to update your signature. I like it and its a great idea, but you might want to change that to Navy Seals, as the Army does not have Seals. We have Rangers and Special Forces :)

maringoman's avatarmaringoman

Now thats a great lottery story.

These are the stories that should be in that show in TV that likes to make lottery winners like total idiots. I am so happy for them. Obviously the happiness they're drawing from the money will make them live forever.

blackjack26241

I am going to start my Foundation to help the poor and lay low otherwise and help alot of other people in secret discret ways.Big Smile

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