Million Dollar Georgia Lottery Winner

     Georgia Lottery officials travelled to nearby Rising Fawn, Georgia Thursday afternoon to give a million dollars to a happy grandfather with a winning Extreme Green ticket.
     WDEF News 12's Mandy Odom caught the emotional presentation for us at a Dade County convenience store.
     Winner Kurt Earley says, "I scratched it. The first one I scratched off was a million dollars."
     Kurt Earley says he hasn't slept well since it happened last Wednesday.
     He stops at the Rising Fawn Pilot Travel Center at least once a month on his way to buy socks in Alabama for resale.
     Earley says, "I buy a lottery ticket every time, and I never expected this."
     He won 200 dollars on the way down, so on the way back to Kentucky he stopped again to cash it and get gas.
     Earley says if it wasn't for the cashier putting his money on the wrong pump, he wouldn't have gone back inside and bought more tickets.
     He won his million dollars playing a 10 dollar extreme green instant lottery game.
     Earley says, "I looked at God. I said thank-you God, and I cried."
     Earley says he didn't even finish scratching the ticket before calling his wife Theresa.
     Earley says, "I told her I'm on my way home with a million dollars, and she said you are lying."
     Theresa Earley says, "Look at the ticket again. It's like come on now honey, you can't really be a millionaire. He was crying, and I thought maybe something bad had happened and someone had called him because I could barely understand him, and he's like honey i'm a millionaire. I'm like no you're not." 
     Health problems forced Kurt into unemployment from his brick laying job several years ago.
     Theresa Earley says, "He's had a hard time of it. He's got protruding discs in his neck, and he's had a lot of problems, and I thought you know at least this is the good Lord's way of helping us out and helping our kids down the road."
     Theresa says the money releases stress for them knowing their family will be taken care of financially.
     In Dade County, Mandy Odom WDEF News 12.
     The Earley's plan to put their money into C-D's.    
     While it doesn't get a cut because it was an instant game, Pilot Travel Center employees say they expect extra business as an official lottery "lucky store."