It could happen here.

Thursday, August 30, 2001

It could happen here.

How many times have you heard this phrase? When a tragedy strikes a community, "It could happen here."

That’s about as likely as someone around here hitting the Powerball’s $295 million jackpot right? Well, that did happen in our region.

When the winning numbers were drawn in last Sunday’s multi-state lottery, 46-year-old David Edwards of the Ashland, Ky. area was the holder of one of the four winning tickets that were sold nationwide.

Droves of people played. Offices pooled money together in hopes of sharing one of the largest jackpots in the history of all lotteries. People likely put off buying necessities to purchase lottery tickets, hoping to never have to worry about wanting again.

Lottery fever is contagious, especially when the jackpots grow to outrageous amounts of money. The word "million" has a way of luring people to convenience stores and other lottery outlets nationwide.

We can all dream of hitting the lottery, can’t we? But in Mr. Edwards’ case, that dream is now a reality – a big $294.8 million reality.