Perry County lottery player claims $42.5 million Hoosier prize

A Perry County man has claimed a $42.5 million Hoosier Lottery prize, turning a free ticket into the fourth-largest jackpot in Hoosier Lotto history. He claimed the money at the Hoosier Lottery’s Prize Payment office after redeeming the ticket at the On the Fly gas station on 12th Street in Tell City for the March 12 drawing.

Officials said the winner was a lifelong Perry County resident who regularly plays the Hoosier Lottery. The winning ticket came from a free play, and he earned it by matching two of six numbers in a previous drawing. That is the kind of small-step result that can lead to an outsized payday, especially when the prize is tied to a local store and a familiar stretch of road in Tell City.

The public record now ends at the claim itself: the ticket, the drawing, the prize amount and the official payout process. The Hoosier Lottery said the payment was processed through its Prize Payment office, moving the win from a ticket in hand to an officially claimed jackpot.

In Perry County, the news is already the sort of story that travels fast because it belongs to a neighbor, not a distant winner. A jackpot of this size naturally stirs questions about whether the money will stay local, support family needs or find its way into charitable giving, but those plans have not been made public. What is known is that one Perry County household now holds a prize that changes the scale of a personal windfall and puts Tell City into the Hoosier Lotto record book.

The March 12 drawing also gives the win a clear local anchor. The ticket was redeemed at On the Fly on 12th Street, a place many Perry County drivers know well, and the county name attached to the prize is enough to make the payoff feel shared even though the winnings belong to one person. For a county this size, that connection between a corner store, a state lottery game and a $42.5 million payout is the detail people will remember.