Elk's Lodge hands out its highest jackpot ever
Lodge planning to change rules after crazy aces winnings climb to more than $65,000
Meagan Leonard
Northern News Services
Wednesday, April 29, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
The Elk's Lodge will be putting a cap on its popular crazy aces raffle after one lucky winner took home a pot of $65,214 Saturday night.
Lodge member Karen MacKinnon told Yellowknifer it was the largest win she had ever seen in the game's history.
"It's a game of chance and it just kept growing," she said. "The previous highest total was around $11,000."
In crazy aces, a drum is filled with 52 eggs, each containing a playing card from a full deck and a jackpot is started at $500. Each card is given a prescribed value and one is drawn every Friday and Saturday.
The game restarts if the ace of spades is drawn, entitling the winner to the jackpot. If the jackpot goes unclaimed the total is increased by half of the draw's profit.
"When it went on Saturday there were only two eggs left ... it's been growing for six months," said MacKinnon. "The people who were picking these little eggs out of the drum just did not pick the right one but it's a game of chance."
The lucky recipient was Hilda Camirand - a regular at the lodge. Camirand told Yellowknifer she isn't sure what she will do with the winnings just yet but expects it will come in handy when she retires.
"I was pretty surprised and it was so surreal. I think it took me an hour and I was still vibrating - I was very shocked," she said. "I was there with my friends, everybody was very happy for me and then I bought a round for the crowd."
MacKinnon says the organization is currently in talks with the city about changing the parameters of the game, adding she expects the cap to be around $30,000.
"We are going to change the format of the game but it will be pretty much the same. It just won't grow to $60,000," she said.
