$6 Tip Leads to $500,000 Prize for Paulding Cook

Joyce Harvey Cunningham, a cook from Paulding County, has won a $500,000 top prize playing $500,000 Green, a Georgia Lottery instant game.

Cunningham, a Dallas resident, said that after receiving a $6 tip, she bought the ticket.

Austell Food Store, 5565 Powder Springs Road in Austell, sold it. Cunningham scratched it in the store.

“It seems like a dream,” she said.

Cunningham, 61, claimed her prize Tuesday at Georgia Lottery headquarters in Atlanta.

The lucky grandmother of four who has two adult daughters plans to purchase a new home for herself.

“I’ll help my daughter buy one, too,” she shared.

Since its first year, the Georgia Lottery Corp. has returned more than $14 billion to the state of Georgia for education. All Georgia Lottery profits go to pay for specific educational programs, including Georgia’s HOPE Scholarship Program and Georgia’s Pre-K Program. More than 1.4 million students have received HOPE, and more than 1.2 million 4-year-olds have attended the statewide, voluntary prekindergarten program.