Nebraska man claims $1M jackpot at SD casino

PINE RIDGE, S.D. (AP) — A Nebraska man has claimed a $1 million jackpot at Pine Ridge’s Prairie Wind Casino, where he’d spent part of Valentine’s Day with his wife of 60 years.

Gordon “Bud” Thompson, a retired railroad conductor from Alliance, Neb., said his wife Donna was the one playing at the casino. He decided to try a few spins on a nearby Freedom Rings machine as he waited for her to finish.

He put about $9 worth of quarters into the three-reel machine and hit a jackpot worth about $1,037,000.

“I didn’t even realize what had happened right away,” Thompson, 80, told KOTA-TV.

The machine locked up and required a casino worker to verify the size of the payout.

“All at once, it hits you in the fanny and you just don’t know what to think,” Thompson told the Rapid City Journal.

He said he doesn’t expect to get the payout until spring, at the earliest.

Thompson’s family — including three sons, 12 grandchildren and 17 great grandchildren — are ecstatic, he said.

“A family meeting will decide the outcome of the funds,” he said, adding that they don’t have extravagant plans in the works. “We’ve been pretty well satisfied with what we’ve got.”