Man survives cancer twice — then wins $4.6M lottery ticket jackpot

Stu MacDonald has defied many odds.

After beating cancer not once, but twice, the Oregon resident received the ultimate congratulatory gift: a winning lottery ticket valued at US$4.6 million.

“I’m a very lucky guy,” he told the Oregon Lottery. “I have survived cancer twice and here I am. This is amazing.”

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Macdonald and his wife, Claudia, bought lottery tickets weekly, and she never forgot to remind her husband to “get the winning ticket,” the organization’s press release reads.

Apparently, the day he bought the winning ticket — Sept. 7 — was the first time she forgot the important reminder.

MacDonald went for a quick-pick ticket at Ashley’s Café in Bend. He went on to take home US$1.56 million after taxes after opting for a bulk sum payment of US$2.3 million.

The release says the cafe will receive a one per cent selling bonus of US$46,000.

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“We are thrilled to learn that we sold a Megabucks jackpot,” Tezra Kong, director of operations for Ashley’s, told the Oregon Lottery. “We are excited for the team who sold the ticket.

“A big congratulations to our guests on their windfall. Some of the seller’s bonus will go back to the team that strive to delight our guests every day here at Ashley’s in Wagner Mall.”

Luck has run through Manitoba water, too.

Just last year, a 28-year-old from Winnipeg won back-to-back lotteries in the same year.

Melhig Melhig won $2 million and, five months later, took home another $1.5 million, HuffPost reports.

Melhig, who immigrated from Africa with his family, told the publication that he moved into a bigger home and planned to buy a business and go back to school.

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“I want to improve my English and communication. And I want to learn something useful, like carpentry,” he said in a press release.

Speaking to CBC, the Western Canada Lottery Corporation said he isn’t the first to win two lotteries in the province.

A woman bought a ticket at her grandson’s Winnipeg hockey tournament and won $1 million in 2005, then won the same amount again after buying a ticket at the same tournament two years later.

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meaghan.wray@globalnews.ca