Eastern Iowa Woman Buys Lottery Ticket in Memory of Mother, Wins $30,000 Prize
Je Rita Whitman Claims Top Prize in '$30,000 Crossword' Scratch Game
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CLIVE, Iowa — An eastern Iowa woman who won a $30,000 scratch prize said her big win brought back warm memories of her mother.
"I only scratch because my mother used to love them," Je Rita Whitman told officials Tuesday as she claimed her prize at the lottery's Cedar Rapids regional office. "She loved $3 Crosswords and she actually hit a $30,000 win herself. It's almost the anniversary of her death, one year, and so I bought that ticket because I was thinking of her, and we used to scratch them together and laugh about her winning that one time. So I think she's up there pulling strings for me."
Whitman, 61, of Anamosa, won the 31st top prize in the Iowa Lottery's "$30,000 Crossword" scratch game. She bought her winning ticket at Casey's, 23485 County Road E34 in Anamosa, where she stopped on her way in to work at the University of Iowa Hospitals in Iowa City.
After getting to work, she scratched the ticket and thought she'd won $100 until she scanned it with the Iowa Lottery mobile app and realized her prize was much larger.
"I just kept looking at it and I was like, 'No way!'" she recalled with a laugh. "I got so nervous about it, I had to call my husband and have him drive to Iowa City and pick up the ticket for me and take it home. I had to work all night and I was afraid I was going to lose it or something."
Whitman said she was delighted to follow in the footsteps of her mother, Sonja Warren, who won a $30,000 Iowa Lottery prize in 2015.
"She was so excited, so tickled. She enjoyed it so much," Whitman said. "It's kind of crazy: You just don't think that kind of thing will happen to you, especially two in the same family," she added. "That's very unique."
Whitman said she and her husband, Bradley, have a plan for the winnings.
"I'm getting ready to retire, so we were thinking about having a cabin someday," she said. "My mom really loved to fish, too, so that was always my dream to have a cabin and fishing on a lake. She was right there with me, she thought that was a great idea, so that's what I'm going to do."
The $30,000 Crossword game is a $3 scratch game that features 151 top prizes of $30,000 and overall odds of 1 in 3.52. For more information about this game, and the number of prizes still available, visit www.ialottery.com.
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