Nervously clutching his massive check, Hoover said he’d fallen asleep on the beach. ![]() Inside Hoover’s home, Amy Murray, a loyal McDonald’s spokesperson, encouraged him to tell the camera about the luckiest moment of his life. Monopoly quickly became the company’s most lucrative marketing device since the Happy Meal. “Don’t go to jail! Go to McDonald’s and play Monopoly for real!” cried Rich Uncle Pennybags, the game’s mustachioed mascot, on TV commercials that sent customers flocking to buy more food. Armed robbers even held up restaurants demanding Monopoly tickets. Just like the Monopoly board game, which was invented as a warning about the destructive nature of greed, players traded game pieces to win, or outbid each other on eBay. There were two ways to win the Monopoly grand prize: Find the “Instant Win” game piece like Hoover, or match Park Place with the elusive Boardwalk to choose between a heavily taxed lump sum or a $50,000 check every year for 20 years. ![]() Like winning the Powerball, the odds of Hoover’s win were 1 in 250 million. But Hoover, a casino pit boss who had recently filed for bankruptcy, claimed he’d won the grand prize–$1 million. By completing groups of properties like Baltic and Mediterranean Avenues, players won cash or a Sega Game Gear, while “Instant Win” game pieces scored a free Filet-O-Fish or a Jamaican vacation. Since 1987, McDonald’s customers had feverishly collected Monopoly game pieces attached to drink cups, french fry packets, and advertising inserts in magazines. ![]() The 56-year-old bachelor had called a McDonald’s hotline to say he’d won their Monopoly competition. They carried their cameras and a giant cashier’s check to a row of townhouses, and knocked on the door of Michael Hoover. 3, 2001, a McDonald’s film crew arrived in the bustling beach town of Westerly, Rhode Island.
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