MANISTIQUE, Mich. — The millionaire opened his barn door and was greeted by the clucks of a thousand chickens.
Jeff LaBar walked into his chicken coop, gathered the eggs that had been laid overnight and brought them into the house to wash them by hand, one at a time, before packing them up and driving them to the few local supermarkets that are LaBar Poultry Farm's loyal customers.
Earlier that morning, the 53-year-old had gotten off his 12-hour overnight shift at the local lime plant, a second job he took awhile back to make ends meet. He napped for a few hours as the sun rose, and then got up to work with his wife, Heidi LaBar, on their chicken farm.
It was like any other day. Even though it didn't have to be anymore.
Just a few months ago, his house was in foreclosure. His chicken farm had few customers. He worked constantly. Then one day, on the way to work, he stopped at the gas station in town, grabbed the Lotto47 form, penciled in the numbers 14-18-23-28-37-40, and forgot about it.
A few days later, word spread around this town of about 3,000 — small by downstate standards, pretty big by Up North ones — that someone way up here in Manistique had hit it big and won the $3.3 million jackpot in the May 21 drawing.
LaBar didn't think anything of it.
"My brother flagged me over when I was getting out here to do chores and he said, 'Did you know someone in town hit the lottery? ... You should check your tickets.'"
Next time Jeff was in the house and remembered to look, he glanced at his lottery slip.
Instantly, this Up North, home-foreclosed, two-job-working chicken farmer was a millionaire.
"I found out it was me and totally I just dropped to my knees," he said. "Literally, I just prayed right there. I'm a born-again Christian, but I still played tickets and stuff, cause everybody needs a break."
He collected his winnings. Then he went right back to work.
Out of prison
Jeff and Heidi live in a house built onto an old barn just off a two-lane rural road. His mom's little house is next door. His brother lives across the street.
He's unassuming and polite, looks younger than his age and speaks with a distinct Yooper accent. His demeanor is humble.
It's a trait he developed while trying to rebound after years of getting into trouble. He was raised in Manistique, served a few years in the Navy, then came back home and became a drug user, then a drug dealer, then an inmate when he got caught and was sentenced to 10-20 years in prison. He was released after seven.
When he got out, few people wanted anything to do with him.
"Everybody turned away," he said. "My family — my brother and my mom and my dad — were pretty much the only ones that stood by me and were there for me as much as they could be. But all the people who were all my so-called friends never talked to me."
But he was a changed man, he said. He'd become religious. He sobered up. Kept out of trouble. Worked hard. Met Heidi in church and married her.
And he started his own chicken farm, something he had wanted since he was a kid, when he watched his mom raise a few birds for the family.
He loves his chickens. During good times and bad times, they've been the one reliable constant he's had.
"I've always liked chickens," he said. "And I said I'd just like to do that for a living. But up here, we're so far from any populace or anywhere that would buy the needed amount to sustain or to make a living, so it's never really panned out."
His luck always seemed bad. He got a job as a lineman for an electric company, then got hit by a truck on the job. When he recovered, the company let him go.
He fell behind on his high-interest mortgage and was on the verge of losing his house.
Even when his fortunes seemed to be changing, they really weren't. This spring, he'd bought a lottery ticket and misread the results, and thought he'd won a million dollars. He and the store clerk were jumping up and down in excitement.
Then they realized he'd won only $100. "I thought I saw a lot more zeros," he admitted.
But he kept buying tickets. Two weeks later, everything changed.
Too scared to change
"At first I was like, 'Oh my goodness, you can quit your job!' cause that's what he really wanted to do,'" said Heidi, 59. "But he's always been a worker, so chances are he'll always be working. I can't see him not having chickens. He just lives and breathes them."
Jeff admits he is too scared to change how he lives.
"I never had money to invest," he said. "So I don't know anything about that, like I'm totally lost about that. It's just such a big step to trust somebody with investing that money. And then quit your job that you already have and everyone likes you and you're doing halfway decent with that..."
The couple opted for the lump-sum payment, which brought their earnings down to $2.1 million. Taxes cut that remainder nearly in half. But it's still a lot of money for a guy who had so little of it for so long.
"It was just a relief to know that we have security in retirement now that we never had before," Heidi said. "It's wonderful."
They went to the lottery office, taking along their toy poodle Bailey because he's part of the family, too, and smiled as they were given an oversize novelty check. They've still got it in their house.
There were no big parties, no expensive toys, no long trips. The only two indulgences the couple allowed themselves were to take a family vacation to Florida to see relatives, and a golf cart Jeff bought because he thought it would make it easier for his wife to haul eggs from the barn up to the house instead of walking.
Otherwise, life goes on as it did before.
Jeff takes care of his farm, works at the lime plant all night, naps a few hours, then starts the cycle over.
On top of that, he has a car-detailing business on the farm. And his wife has her own home business, Manistique Upholstery, fixing people's pickup seats. Like a lot of people in the U.P., where there aren't a whole lot of places to work, they have different jobs during different seasons, hoping all of them add up to a decent living.
Everything is different for them, and yet nothing really is. Except now, Jeff's free to be what he always wanted to be — just an Up North chicken farmer.
"I prayed for years and years and years for some type of turnaround, a blessing somehow," Jeff said. "I don't care if I'm filthy rich, but... maybe get it so I don't need to be going to work at that lime plant. Make it so I can get out of there and just do my little farming thing."
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Geez,
I love reading stories like this.
Congrats Jeff!
The lottery is helping the economy?
Know that Yooper accent well, Congrats to Jeff and Heidi, enjoy!
Do YOU have a yooper accent sully? LOL.
What does it sound like?
I lived up there for 8 years, no accent. lol
Hard to describe,( about) sounds like" a boot"
Best wishes to Jeff & Heidi.
I'm always glad to hear that someone who could really use the help is a winner!
WOW what a story. Well good for him.
Congrats to Jeff and his Wife.
Congratulation Jeff and Heidi love reading stories like this what a blessing, glad he was able to turn his life around
Congratulations Jeff and Heidi!! What a great story.
Awesome!
Congratulations Jeff & Heidi.
You go right ahead and " count your chickens!"
Great win!!! I'am so happy of his turn around, now he understands the simple things are the most important. Him and his family will do well!!!
I 'am hungry I think I will have some eggs lol;mmmmmmmmm
What did the egg say to the clown ??? You crack me up lol....So good to hear a good story these days.
Coincidentally enough, if I win the lottery I want to buy some land out in the country so I can raise chickens. I won't have thousands, but a hundred or so will feed me, my family and any neighbors that want some, donate some to a food bank if they're close enough. I'll feed the rest to the hogs, dogs and cats.
I am so happy for you Jeff CONGRATULATION! I am so happy to hear anyone wins big but especially a born again Christian!!! Most people will use their prize for mostly selfish gains and it's nothing wrong with that cause we're selfish people, but evil folks will probably use money to produce more wickedness, s really good decent people should win more it's good for the society and their surroundings! I don't go to casino but I love the state lotteries it funds it's own states in a good cause. Alabama is so poor it doesn't have a lottery system but it has casinos sadly.
Wonder if my chickens have hatched yet!
I am happy that you won Jeff and Heidi!!!
Great story
You got to go though,to get though. Great story.
Transforming his life into a productive one is the best thing he did for himself. The Lord must have decided to throw him a bone. A golden bone!
I like Heidi's golf cart !!!!!! Go Heidi GO !!!!<scratchin head> not sure how that buggy works in the snow.
Great story and congrats to them.
I could use some of that chicken feed
Now they can write a book on 101 types of Quiche.
great story but the title is misleading isn't it ?he never mentions that 3mil. bucks r just chicken feed ...on the contrary he is saving the mulah and spending very wise and still works hard...oh well only a winner could notice the appparent flaws in news just like in the daily games...
No, and I don't think it was meant that way. I used to write headlines and it was an attempt at being "cutesy", but it also tied in that he's a chicken farmer and a Christian and the article states that the win will give him peace of mind and the ability to keep doing what he loves.
Besides all that, chicken feed ain't "chicken feed" these days - it's not nearly as cheap as it once was. That's the thing I found misleading about the headline.
Hope they invested in a good security system after they did that story.
Wonder how many of those people who shunned him after prison have come out of the woodworks!
i understand your point mike !but you see it like that cos you know the innerworkings ,for most ppl they assume and click on the news based on the pshycolgical impact it makes in their mind...so saying oh you know i won 3 million bucks ..but is just chicken feed for me...is the opposite of what this money means for this person and what hard path he had until he was blessed with this win.
Headline writing is nearly a lost art. A good headline should catch the eye and generate interest; it's the very first impression a prospective reader gets of the article...or in here, the subject of the post. (this wasn't Todd's headline - it was the one on the article cited from the Detroit Free Press. USA Today used the exact same one) You want to write a headline that will pique someone's curiosity, but not so much that it tells too much of the story...you want the readers to read the piece, not skip over it.
Headline writing is more complicated in print media than it is writing an article for the 'net. Writing a headline for a newspaper means trying to cram the best headline into the space allotted, with a minimum number of letters for it to look good and a hard cap on the maximum (to fit the column and keep the headline to a single line). Letters have different counts: lower case letters count as one except for "skinny" letters such as f l i t j, which count 1/2. The small case m & w count as 1 1/2. All upper-case letters count as 1 1/2 except the "I" which was 1/2 and M & W count as two. Numbers count one, except for "1", which counts 1/2. (that was always my favorite rule, always sounded funny to me.) Each space and punctuation mark counts as 1/2 except for ? and ! which counted one.
It used to be considered so important that newspapers and magazines had a person who specialized in it and sometimes did nothing but headlines. (Today a computer can do the calculations) I majored in journalism when I went to college, but I didn't finish. (prob. b/c I actually majored in pot and minored in pinball) I used to compete in Headline Writing when I was in h.s. and went to state two yrs. in a row, winning 2nd and 3rd. I also used to help out my hometown newspaper when I lived down there and the owner/publisher loved my headlines. I was always a fan of using alliteration when I could, such as:
Minnesota Millionaire Mom Masters Mega Millions!
Catchy, and the title tells the story - the place and person (and most people love moms!) and pulls people in with the assumption that she knows the secret to winning the lottery. I think people would read the article.
Pretty interesting Mike.
The headline did pique my interest, and as I read the article, I understood exactly what the headline was meant to do; tie in to the fact he's a chicken farmer and he loves it. I thought it was pretty good.
I was in journalism in high school, and the sports editor. My teacher was a older lady who was tough, but probably the best teacher I ever had. I wanted to go to Ohio State and study journalism, but I knew I didn't have the grades or the money, so that never happened. Now as I see what has become of today's media, I know Miss Purcell would be rolling in her grave.
My teacher was a older lady who was tough, but probably the best teacher I ever had.
Mine too! I wanted to wait a yr. before going off to college, wanted to roughneck and save some money and buy a nicer car, but my mom insisted. I resented that and didn't try very hard. I still got decent grades in most of the classes, but just didn't have my heart in it. I later went back to school some years ago and got a technical degree.
I think we're about the same age and when I went off to college, I could see how progressive - politically speaking - the field of journalism was becoming. I wasn't political then and had the liberal mindset of most kids that age, but the obvious bias and slant didn't set well with me and I had some spats with the dept head. I tried to get enthused about college, but simply couldn't. I even tried to be a walk-on for the football team, but I didn't even make it past the first drill before I went on back to the locker room and changed back into street clothes. I was pretty close to being the smallest guy out there and was by far the slowest. <grin> I certainly couldn't see any future in being a human tackling dummy.
Man this dude is in shape! Looks like he pumps iron or maybe its just from the hard work.
A million after taxes ain't what it used to be but it beats the alternative. Congrats to both of them. They seem to be the kind that will keep the money.
Now.....if i can just convince him to eat raw nuts & seeds(no oil soaking) for protein instead of eggs we can keep his total cholesterol level under 100 so he can avoid heart disease & cancer to live past a 100 disease free to enjoy it all!
I'm glad to see the guy was able to turn his life around for the better. Many drug users aren't able to.