A U.S. Army veteran got the surprise of her life when she made history on the beloved game show The Price is Right.
Vanesa McCaskell won the largest single pricing-game win ever when she was competing on the show during a Mother’s Day episode, and now she is enjoying those winnings, USA Today reported Friday.
She won while playing “The Lion’s Share” and her take home amount was $227,500 in cash along with a mother‑daughter trip to Morocco. The combined value was $240,150.
Video footage of her epic win showed McCaskell on the stage with host Drew Carey, and the crowd went wild as she just kept on winning. Just before the final move, the veteran, who is a huge fan of the daytime game show, chose the numbers of her daughter’s birthday.
“Well, her birthday is a lucky one because it’s $100,000!” the announcer said. McCaskell’s daughter leaped to her feet and the crowd joined in the celebration:
In her final move, McCaskell chose number eight and that won her the trip to Morocco. During an interview with Today before the episode aired, McCaskell said, “I was just so excited to even be in the position to play the game, let alone win” and described it as “life-changing.”
The veteran said the episode was taped in December and she was forced to keep the win a secret until now.
“It was torture. I was practicing my poker face so I didn’t crack when people asked me what happened. They’d say, ‘Did you win?’ and I’d say, ‘No.’ It was really, really tough to hold that,” she recalled, adding she was going to make wise investments with the money and also buy her own mother something nice.
The Price is Right premiered in 1972 and is television’s longest-running game show, according to the National Association of Broadcasters, noting that Carey succeeded longtime host Bob Barker.
Video footage from Barker’s first episode shows him calling on members of the audience to join him onstage:
The recently introduced “Lion’s Share” is a guessing game where contestants can earn up to five balls that potentially yield big rewards, per Today.