Red Hot

“It’s been pretty crazy around here.”

Denise Metzger, Manager of the MotoMart in Red Bud

Photo by Lisa Brewster (Creative Commons)

Red Bud, Illinois (population 3,619) is red hot. One of the three winning Mega Millions lottery tickets was sold in this small town, and nobody knows who bought it.

The ticket, estimated to be worth $213.3 million, was sold at the local MotoMart. National and international reporters have set up camp in the store’s parking lot waiting for the winner to come forward.

Someone reported that a guy named Gary Liefer was the winner. There are two Gary Liefers in the area. One says he never bought a ticket; the other says his wife bought a ticket, but it wasn’t a winner. Both are busy fielding calls from the press and long-lost friends and relatives.

Denise Metzger, manager of the MotoMart, says she has a gut feeling the ticket was bought by a local. In Illinois where the winner may choose to remain anonymous, lottery officials say we may never know who bought the ticket.

But I don’t think so. A secret is hard thing to keep in a small town like Red Bud—especially a $213.3 million secret.

Read more:

■  Maria Baran, ‘This put a small town like Red Bud on the map’: Winning lottery ticket sold in metro-east, Belleville News Democrat, March 31, 2012.

■  Janet Lonsdale and Barry Paddock, Mega dreams sprout in Red Bud, Illinois over $656 million jackpot, New York Daily News, April 1, 2012.