In true Kentucky fashion, woman plans to build dream horse barn with Powerball win
A woman from Murray who raises horses now plans to build the barn of her dreams after a six-figure payout from a winning Powerball ticket.
Shannon Williams stopped at a gas station in Hopkinsville Feb. 23. She was on her way back home from Tennessee, where she had memorialized her late father, Kerry, who died in 2022.
It was the weekend before her father’s birthday. The sun was shining and there was an amazing energy about, Williams told Kentucky Lottery officials, according to a March 7 news release. She initially walked out of the gas station where she bought the winning ticket, but walked back in on a whim.
“I decided to turn around and walk back in and I said: ‘I’m going to play the Powerball because I feel like my dad is with me.’ … I just had this overwhelming feeling. So, I bought the ticket,” Williams said.
Her ticket matched four white ball numbers and the red Powerball, meaning she won the game’s $50,000 prize. However, because she had purchased the game’s Power Play add-on for an extra buck, her prize was multiplied, in this case by three.
The winning numbers for the Feb. 24 Powerball draw were 10, 11, 34, 59, 68 and Powerball 14, according to the lottery’s website. Powerball prize range from $4 to the rolling jackpot win, and the odds of the $50,000 are 1 in 913,129.
Feb. 25, one day after Williams confirmed the Powerball win, is her father’s birthday. Previously, she had only played Powerball once, although she plans to continue to play given her recent win, the lottery said.
After taxes, Williams took home a check for $110,000. She plans to build the barn her father, who raised his own horses on a Tennessee farm, would have dreamed of.
“I’m going to build the barn that my daddy wanted me to have for all these horses I’ve worked so hard for the past two years,” Williams said. “I feel that my dad would be very proud.”
The Murray woman joins other recent Kentucky Lottery Powerball players, including a Lexington couple who also won the $50,000 prize in early February.
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