#powerball Osage Man Claims $2 Million Powerball® Prize

August 30th, 2014

A northern Iowa man's lottery prediction has come true.

"I actually told everybody, 'I'm going to win, I'm going to hit it,'" Duane Hanson of Osage said with a grin as he claimed a $2 million Powerball prize on Thursday.

And how long has he been making that prediction?

"A long time," he said with a laugh.

Hanson, 58, who works as a conductor for the Cedar River Railroad in Waterloo, bought a ticket that came close to winning Wednesday night's $80 million jackpot, matching the first five numbers but missing the Powerball. But Hanson also added the Power Play option to his ticket, which multiplied his initial $1 million prize to $2 million.

Hanson bought his winning ticket at Casey's, 309 Main St. in Osage. His was one of two tickets nationwide to win a $2 million prize in Wednesday's Powerball drawing.

Casey's will receive a $2,000 bonus from the lottery for the $2 million-winning ticket being sold at its Osage store.

Hanson, who said he plans to retire in 2015, and his lottery winnings will greatly help with his retirement investments.

"I've actually been worried about my 401K," he said. "Now I'm not worried about that so much. I've been talking about when I retire, maybe buying an acreage. Maybe I can do that a little sooner now."

Hanson said he has played the same set of numbers in Powerball for years, just a random set of numbers that he chose one day and decided to keep playing. He's been on vacation this week, so it was about 9 a.m. Thursday when he called the lottery's winning numbers line to check his ticket from Wednesday's drawing. After realizing he'd matched five numbers, he went to the lottery website to double-check what he'd won. Still uneasy, he called his daughter, Samantha, who lives with him in Osage, and the two of them went to the Casey's store where he'd bought his ticket and used the lottery's self-checker there to scan the ticket. The machine's display confirmed that he'd won $2 million.

"I couldn't believe it," Samantha Hanson said. "I'm happy for him."

The two decided to go to the lottery right away so Duane could claim his prize.

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